One of the quieter gems that has slipped past in the last few weeks is Raj Rachakonda's Mallesham, his debut feature in Telugu. It is a long time since I saw an Indian feature that was this culturally rich. The film is a biopic of Padma Shri Chintakindi Mallesham, who invented the 'asu' machine, that mechanically prepares the yarn base, on which the famous Pochampally and ikat saris are woven in Telangana.

The film is set in a village of Pochampally sari weavers. As a kid, Mallesham sees his mother Lakshmi (the dignified Jhansi) prepare the asu, painstakingly weaving the threads to prepare the yarn base for the sari, before his father can weave the designs on it. Her shoulders ache terribly, and Mallesham promises her that when he grows up, he will do something to relieve her pain. Mallesham is forced to drop out of school to work the loom to help feed his family. As a young adult, Mallesham (Priyadarshi Pulikonda) grows obsessed with creating an asu machine that will mechanically do what his mother—and hundreds of other women—do painstakingly by hand. He is widely taunted and incurs debts while experimenting with the machine. Meanwhile, he also falls in love with the charming Padma (Ananya Nagalla) and marries her. His wife understands that his obsession for the machine is because he is considerate to women weavers. They move to the city to work undisturbed, where Mallesham undertakes humiliating jobs, such as driving an auto rickshaw, to make ends meet. Eventually, after many struggles, he creates a mechanical asu that his mother inaugurates, at the press of a button. The film ends with the real-life Mallesham delivering a TEDx talk on how his machine has improved the lives of thousands of weavers.