Glenda Kwek's Portfolio

Text and video correspondent with Agence France-Presse, based in Mumbai, India

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India's largest winemaker Sula Vineyards is set to go public, betting on the diversifying tastebuds of a booming urban middle class in a country that's long favoured strong liquor. I look at the growth opportunities and challenges facing Sula for AFP. You can read the text story here.

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India is set to become the world's most-populous nation next year, overtaking China. But how are its cities coping? In "Maximum City" Mumbai, one of the world's most densely populated cities, people battle for space and resources to make ends meet. Here’s my video for AFP. 

And here is the text story, which takes a broader look at the challenges India will face over the next few decades, including more strain on already overstretched urban infrastructure such as transport, water, sanitation, sewage: Cities under strain: India's predicted urban boom

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It was awesome to get to spend time with the artists and workers making Ganesha idols for the annual Ganesh Chaturthi festival, where tens of thousands of people packed the streets to take part in colour celebrations. Excitement levels were particularly high after two years of Covid curbs.  

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A grim start to Mumbai’s monsoon season with the collapse of a four-storey building killing 19 people. Building collapses are common during India's June-September monsoon season, with old and rickety structures buckling under days of non-stop rain.

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I got the chance to travel with colleagues Punit Paranjpe and Nivrita Ganguly to Surat in Gujarat state to shoot this video feature on the plight of diamond workers as the Ukraine war and sanctions on Russia, India's biggest supplier of "rough" gemstones & a long-standing strategic ally, hit the sector. 

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Our feathered friends struggled through India’s relentless summer heatwave. One animal hospital in the western city of Ahmedabad has treated around 2,000 birds in April-May, many weak and severely dehydrated, with some suffering from broken wings after falling from trees. I was really grateful for the opportunity to work on this text and video feature with AFP veteran and all-round nice guy Sam Panthaky. 

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Shooting this festival -- Gudi Padwa -- which celebrates the arrival of spring in Maharashtra state in India, was a lot of fun. Particularly loved the women bikers. A big thanks to colleague and friend Punit Paranjpe, who told me about this colourful annual event in Mumbai.

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For my first Mumbai video feature, I spent time with transgender women artists who are part of the Aravani Art Project an art collective enpowering transgender people in public spaces across Indian cities where they face harassment and abuse 

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We've always been among the crowd, not on stage or the big screen. So when Dalits see someone from their community and background telling their stories, they feel proud.

Marathi filmmaker Nagraj Manjule tells AFP

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Victims to heroes: India's lower castes take cinematic centre stage

I was absolutely delighted to get the opportunity to interview some of India’s up-and-coming film directors, mostly from non-Hindi language backgrounds, who challenging attitudes with powerful stories of injustice to give the country’s lower-caste and marginalised communities a voice. Here’s my story.

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Twitter's new CEO Parag Agrawal is the latest alumnus of India's prestigious technical universities appointed to head a multi-billion-dollar US tech firm. So why is this trend happening? I visited the Indian Institute of Technology Bombay  -- Agrawal's alma mater -- to find out.

My video essay is above and here is my story.

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I had fun shooting this video to accompany my colleague’s story on a Mumbai company selling toys that challenge long-held taboos in India. The key challenge was to take a shoot in an office environment and make it fun and engaging.

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Greening deserts: India powers renewable ambitions with solar push

As camels munch on the fringes of Thar desert, an oasis of blue solar panels stretches further than the eye can see at Bhadla Park -- a cornerstone of India's bid to become a clean energy powerhouse.

With all eyes on the COP26 UN climate change conference in Glasgow, I visited Bhadla Solar Park, a vast expanse of solar panels on the fringes of the Thar desert in Rajasthan state, with my colleagues Sajjad Hussain and Archana Thiyagarajan to see how India’s ambitious renewables target of 500GW by 2030 can be achieved.

The key takeaways are that the target is very ambitious and will be difficult to reach without significant foreign investment, as well as a huge upgrade of India’s transmission infrastructure. 

Vast solar parks also take up a lot of space, resulting in possible conflicts with local communities on land use and compensation. Experts say the future is in distributed energy, such as rooftop solar panels for homes, schools and clinics.

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In rural India, fear of testing and vaccines hampers Covid-19 fight

When health worker Neelam Kumari knocks on doors in Indian villages the occupants sometimes run out the back, terrified that she wants to vaccinate them against Covid-19.

I travelled with my colleagues to India’s northern state of Haryana where we visited several villages and rural vaccination centres. We found that villagers were highly suspicious of authorities’ testing and vaccination drives for Covid-19, even as they battled a growing number of infections and deaths from the virus.

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Even after opening up a vaccine centre here, nobody is ready to take it. I won't take the vaccine because it has many side effects. People get sick after getting vaccines.

Haryana villager Rajesh Kumar, on vaccine hesitancy in rural India

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Hunger stalks India's poor in pandemic double blow

Rasheeda Jaleel lives in fear that she may not be able to feed her seven children as millions of Indian families are forced into poverty by a devastating new coronavirus wave.

I travelled around India’s capital New Delhi to speak to Indians who have been struggling to make ends meet as the country grapples with a brutal second wave of coronavirus infections. While a lot of the focus has been on the huge medical health crisis, experts said there is a growing long-term epidemic of hunger and poverty as well.

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When we are hungry and thirsty, I feel very helpless and worry, 'How am I going to survive like this?'. We manage with whatever my husband is able to earn. If it's not enough, I stay hungry so I can feed my children.

mother Rasheeda Jaleel on the hunger epidemic during India’s pandemic crisis