Muktotohobil.com, Bangladesh’s first dedicated crowd-funding portal, was created by Gaushey Shahrier as a means to finance his upcoming graphic novel and film, Hasna.
This marks a milestone in Bangladesh for young entrepreneurs and independent projects. This potentially holds unprecedented rewards and could be that start of a new era of funding and investing here.
Bangladesh is a country teeming with young talent, but limited support to direct this talent towards something productive.
Shahrier is the CEO of ParrotInMotion Studio and director of Hasna. He believes that using animation enables his story to reach to a mass audience globally, and inform people of an entrenched societal evil through entertainment. With fast dispersion of nearly infinite amounts of information, our world today is one of instant gratification, and we communicate with images more today than ever before.
Hasna aims to raise awareness about child marriage and gender discrimination.
At muktotohobil.com, people can submit their creative ideas and get the opportunity to raise funds from the general public. Anyone who finds the work interesting can go to the website, click on “Support” and pledge a certain amount of money for the creative ideas.
Crowdfunding can provide a real windfall to artists like Shahrier, whose project’s strong gender relevance and social commentary qualifies it as a social cause as well as an animated film.
Art that speaks for a cause, which stands against a system, belongs in the public sphere. In this regard, it makes sense that this animated film’s funding depends on the public.
For a late-adopting country like Bangladesh, crowdfunding has the potential to be one of the most effective and significant tools to raise funds, giving young innovators and change makers the support they need to develop the country. Exciting times lie ahead!
Three tips from an early-adopter
1. Credibility: Get connected with reputable, established personalities. Hasna has affiliated itself with Haider Rizvi, a Polish film director and former assistant to Roman Polanski, who has been involved with the project as an advisor. A demonstration of credibility is reassuring for potential pledgers.
2. Accessibility: Connect to the “crowd” via support from the media or active social media interactions on Facebook. Honouring contributors with badges and tokens of gratitude after the success of the campaign.
3. Interaction: Interact with the potential contributors regularly and explain that the procedure is not complex.
“A big issue is the payment process,” Shahrier said. “Most people here are not used to online transactions. They feel reluctant to pay via a simple bKash transaction, even though they fully support the project and want to pay. With proper utilisation of social media and regular follow ups, this obstacle can be overcome.”
