‘Dogs howl by the gates, and a few employees gather near the parking lot. Up above the HMT Watch Factory a clock ticks on. Employees point to it saying that once the electricity is cut off, even this symbol of a once-proud factory will stop.’

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- The Hindu, 2016

 

The HMT (Hindustan Machine Tools) Watch Factory, (first Indian mechanical wrist watch manufacturer), closed its doors. The production of these watches, once the pride and joy of the nation, severely declined due to the introduction of Quartz technology. The neighbourhood, once occupied by employees, soon rendered a ghost town, was shot on an iPhone 5 camera with footage from the 50s that recorded the inauguration of the factory and animations of a mechanical watch’s parts play alongside popular Bollywood songs. At the factory itself, there was no farewell function, no speeches and no expression of memories from the many workers who had spent more than three decades there. As the clock stops ticking, this video pays an ode to the clockmaker.