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OM SAKTHI FILMS presents
A Musical Documentary by
Gogularaajan Rajendran
Araro Ariraro is a musical documentary that explores the chasm-like alienation of Tamil workers in Malayan plantations through their ancestral folk songs.
Colonial archives record statistics, dehumanising the workers only as labours.
These Plantation Tamil folk songs resurrect them as living beings, in flesh and spirit, as artists and archivists of their own history.
Early 20th century: Tamil Labour,
The Kangani and their White Master on Rubber Estate in Selangor.
Photo Credit : Collection of National Museum of Singapore
the book
the book
Araro Ariraro is rooted in the songs compiled in Malaysian Folk Songs.
In the 1980s, Dr. R. Dhandayutham, a professor at the University of Malaya, travelled through plantations across Malaysia, recording songs sung by estate workers.
Orally passed down over generations, these lullabies, work songs, resistance chants, love poems, and death laments trace the journey of Indian migration and settlement in Malaysia—oral history set to music.
Dr. Dhandayutham transcribed over 500 songs and published them in a book. But the original recordings are lost.
Only the lyrics survive,
their melodies vanished.
taken from Malaysian Tamil Folk Songs
by Dr. R. Thandayutham
traces the search for the lost melodies of these plantation folk songs.
Director & film-maker, Gogularaajan meets scholars and musicians from Tamil Nadu and Malaysia to reimagine these forgotten tunes.
He then passes the songs to his family—descendants of indentured labourers who lived through both colonial rule and independence.
Together, they carry the songs back to the plantation landscape. There, they perform them.
Through their flesh and blood, where ancestral memory endures, they summon those who came before—and allow the ancestors to sing through them.
Watch the teaser featuring Gogu's collaboration with folk music scholars & musicians from Tamil Nadu.
The Storytellers
The Storytellers
Somewhere in the hundred years of harsh plantation history, my ancestors learned to love this strange land—Malaysia.
It was in the plantations that the unfamiliar became familiar, the foreign became home.
Without understanding this vital part of history, I don’t think I could ever truly understand myself—or my place in this country. ~Gogu
I come from a history shaped in silence. Our ancestors were uprooted and planted in this foreign land, very much like the rubber trees they tended to.
But somehow their stories are seldom brought to light. And while there are countless eurocentric records available, they carry the gaze of the coloniser, lacking agency of the people.
That is why when we found these folk songs without melodies, we knew we had to sing them again.
Because if we don't do it now, we'll lose them forever. ~Kuma
Director Gogularaajan (Gogu) is a Kuala Lumpur-based filmmaker dedicated to telling Malaysian Tamil stories, blending horror and humour through provocative, poetic approaches. As a descendant of South Indian indentured labourers brought by the British to Malaya, he feels compelled to voice the untold stories of his ancestors.
In 2024, he co-curated Seashorts Film Festival’s first program focused on minority Malaysian Indian narratives. Awarded the Krishen Jit Fund in 2021, he has documented Malaysian Indian plantation workers’ lives in his upcoming work Araro Ariraro. Currently, Gogu is developing his debut feature, Kaali, Depth of Darkness. He co-directed the short film Walay Balay, premiered at the 2024 Cannes Directors' Fortnight.
In 2024, he co-curated Seashorts Film Festival’s first program focused on minority Malaysian Indian narratives. Awarded the Krishen Jit Fund in 2021, he has documented Malaysian Indian plantation workers’ lives in his upcoming work Araro Ariraro. Currently, Gogu is developing his debut feature, Kaali, Depth of Darkness. He co-directed the short film Walay Balay, premiered at the 2024 Cannes Directors' Fortnight.
Producer Kumanavannan (Kuma) graduated from UWE Bristols’s law school in 2009, then he joined Astro as an Assistant Producer before producing freelance.
In 2023, he co-founded Om Sakthi Films with Gogu to develop and produce films that tell the stories of the minority Tamil community in Malaysia. Currently alongside Araro Ariraro and Kaali, he is also producing a short film titled Kairu. In 2024 he received the Parabellum Fresh Producer Award at Docs by the Sea.
In 2023, he co-founded Om Sakthi Films with Gogu to develop and produce films that tell the stories of the minority Tamil community in Malaysia. Currently alongside Araro Ariraro and Kaali, he is also producing a short film titled Kairu. In 2024 he received the Parabellum Fresh Producer Award at Docs by the Sea.
Other passions of his include planting and plating food, blues music as well as learning new languages. He divides his time between the hustle and bustle of Kuala Lumpur and the tranquil village of Trimmis..
Other passions of his include planting and plating food, blues music as well as learning new languages. He divides his time between the hustle and bustle of Kuala Lumpur and the tranquil village of Trimmis..
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