Karlovy Vary Title ‘The Ink-Stained Hand and a Missing Thumb’ Lands at Diversion for World Sales (EXCLUSIVE)

World sales rights to Yashasvi Juyal’s debut feature “The Ink-Stained Hand and a Missing Thumb,” which premiered in Karlovy Vary’s Proxima Competition, have gone to Bangkok-based Diversion.

The film’s next stop is the Singapore International Film Festival, where it will have its Asian premiere in the Asian Feature Film Competition.

Uttarakhand-based Silvercord Films produced the feature, with Khan & Kumar Media on board as co-producer. Shaunak Sen, the Oscar-nominated director of Sundance grand jury prize winner “All That Breathes,” serves as executive producer.

The story unfolds at a toll booth station, where Rajji and her co-workers move through the same days on repeat. That rhythm breaks when Santosh, her lover and a fellow migrant worker, is killed in a truck accident while on duty in his booth. Grief settles over the station. Then, a day later, Santosh turns up again – alive, after a fashion. His return defies explanation and proves unsettling. As the booth where he died faces demolition, his hold on the world begins to slip away with it.

“Ghost for us is something which exists. We don’t believe that it’s in stories,” Juyal had told Variety of growing up in the upper Himalayas, where the film’s supernatural register comes from. “Many times we just talk about it naturally that, ‘Oh, you saw a ghost yesterday?’ My friend say, ‘Oh, I saw day before yesterday.’ So, it’s like as common as that, and we all have had our experiences in the upper Himalayas.”

The project drew backing from the Red Sea Fund, Visions Sud Est, Take Ten, the Netflix Fund for Creative Equity, India and Film Companion Studios.

Mai Meksawan closed the deal for Diversion with Juyal of Silvercord Films. Diversion will represent the film at the Busan International Film Festival‘s Asian Contents & Film Market.

The title joins John Torres’ “The Remotes” on Diversion’s current slate. Torres’ film recently premiered in the Toronto Film Festival’s Wavelengths section and the New York Film Festival’s Currents strand.