Skip to content Skip to navigation

Tripura film bags first National Film Award

By editor |

Internationally acclaimed Kokborok film YARWNG (Roots) won the first national film award for Tripura at 56th National Film Awards (2008) held at Vigyan Bhawan, New Delhi, 19 March, 2010. The President of India Smt. Pratibha Devisingh Patil handed over the medal and certificate to Don Bosco priests Joseph Kizhakechennadu (producer) and Fr. Joseph Pulinthanath (director) for their second feature film.


Pulinthanath dressed in white cassock and Kizhakechennadu in his preferred saffron lungi and half-sleeved white kurta were among 52 film award winners of 2008, including high-profile Bollywood actor Priyanka Chopra and the doyen of Indian Cinematography V.K. Murthy who was awarded country’s highest honor in cinema - the Dada Saheb Phalke Award.


Union Minister for Information & Broadcasting, Smt. Ambika Soni and Dr. S. Jagathrakshakan, Minister of State for Information & Broadcasting, and other officials accompanied the President.


Accent on People’s Cinema


The award winning 95 minute film Yarwng (Roots) tells the story of large-scale displacement of tribal people that took place in the tiny Northeastern state when a hydel project was set up there in the late 1970s. Yarwng was the opening film at the prestigious Indian Panorama section of the 39th International Film Festival of India (IFFI) in Panaji, Goa, November 2008.


According to the filmmakers, the script of Yarwng emerged from the numerous encounters they held with displaced people in the sanctity of their ramshackle homes. “All the incidents and emotional turmoil we see in the film were etched in the subconscious psyche of the people. All we did was to get close to them and feel their stories as they recalled them with looks, sighs, tears and also words,” recalled the priest director and winner of national and international awards.


“Although the technical team came from Thiruvananthapuram (Kerala) and the support team from Guwahati (Assam), the best part of the production was the involvement of the local people,” says producer Kizhakechennadu who claims cinematic traditions from his legendary relative John Abraham, a genius in Malayalam cinema and founder of a people's cinema movement called Odessa.


All the artistes and production hands were from Tripura state including noted actors Meena Debbarma who plays the lead role of Karmati, Amulya Ratan Jamatia, Nirmal Jamatia and Surabhi Debbarma.


Yarwng has traveled throughout India and has been screened in major cities around the world including New York, Brisbane, Moscow, Taipei, Stuttgart and Dhaka.


Yarwng also won a Special Jury Mention Award at the 3rd Eye Asian film festival held in Mumbai in 2008.


The film, part-financed by Church organizations – Missio Germany, Signis and the Salesian Congregation is also a compelling testament to the commitment of the Church and the Don Bosco Society to preservation of local, indigenous cultures and people.


C.M. Paul, New Delhi

Comments

KOUSHIK HAZARIKA's picture

Submitted by KOUSHIK HAZARIKA on Sat, 27/03/2010 - 07:06
In the year of the brilliant Samson and Delilah, BIFF will bring a stream of films by or about Indigenous people, called Colourise films. These include The Inheritors, which documents rural Mexico, capturing the dignity and humanity of people in the face of incredible exploitation. Both Roots and Birdwatchers tell a universal story of displacement from land and culture.

Pages

Add new comment

Random Stories

Children Drama Workshop at Nazira

24 Jul 2012 - 2:19pm | SK Hasan
Pragati Maina Parijat, Nazira organised a 15-day Children's Drama Workshop on July1 to 15, 2012 at Srimanta Sankardev Sanghs Namghar. More than 70 children took part in the workshop. In the...

Bordoloi Trophy: 2nd semi final match

27 Dec 2008 - 12:42am | editor
An exciting moment of play during the 2nd semi final match between Oil India Ltd (Yellow-Blue) and Lajong Club of Shillong (Red-White) at the ongoing 57th Bordoloi Trophy Football Tournament...
Journalist meet to 'Focus on Assam' on June 14 at London

Journalist meet to 'Focus on Assam' on June 14 at London

10 Jun 2013 - 10:21pm | Rini Kakati
The High Commission of India partnering Tea Board of India is organising a flagship event on Assam  -  "The Gateway of India's North - East" on June 14 at Mayfair, London. The summit will...

Plantation drive at Bishnu Rabha Park

7 Jul 2013 - 11:15pm | Peter Alex Todd
Janajatiya Yuba Kalyan Parishad took a plantation drive on Sunday at Bishnu Rabha Park, Udalbakra, Guwahati. The park is being set up by the organization as a recreation place. The park also have a...

Other Contents by Author

Wild elephants unleash terror in Guwahati

Once again a hard of wild elephants unleashed a rein of terror in Guwahati on Saturday.The terror strikes at Lakhora area where around 25 wild elephants who have come down from the nearby hills in search of food destroyed crops besides damaging several huts in the evening. A section of local residents have fled from the spot fearing attack amid darkness. Forest department was informed. Bt arrived in the spot two hours after to disperse the herd of wild elephants.

4 militants killed in Dima Hasao

Four Dimasa insurgent activists were killed in an encounter with security forces in Dimahasao Saturday.According to information, four militants belonging to the Dimasa National Revolutionary Front were killed in an encounter at Mailoo village in Langting area during a joint operation launched by the army and police. Three AK-47 rifles with live ammunition was recovered from the ultras. In another operation, the police captured one NSCN(IN) militant from a nearby area.

AGP to support PA Sangma as Prez

AGP comes in support of PA Sangma in the country’s presidential polls slated for July 19. The regional party took the decision when it held its newly formed executive panel meeting at the Ambari-based party headquarters on Friday. The party further strongly criticized the Gogoi government alleging a string of anti-people policies.

Kamakhya all abuzz as Ambubachi underway

The famed Kamakhya Temple remains closed for three days from Friday on account of Ambubachi being joined by thousands of people from the country and abroad. The temple door closed at 6:12 in the morning on Friday to reopen at 7 in the morning on June 25. Devotees from all over the country and abroad are thronging in thousands at the temple atop the Nilachal Hills where a grand mela is underway amid tight security bandobast. According to Kamrup (Metro) district administration, over 600 security personnel have been deployed on Nilachal Hills as more than three lakh devotees were expected to visit the temple during the three-day festival. Round the clock vigil would be maintained in and...

2 crushed to death by trains

Speeding trains crushed to death two youths in two separate incidents on Friday. The first incident took place in the wee hours near Baihata in Kamrup(Rural) district. A youth had boarded the Dn Ernakulam Express at Guwahati and was standing near the door of a coach when he fell on the tracks near Baihata station. He died on the spot. Identified as Ujwal Paul of Nagaon, he was on the way to Kerala for a job interview.In another incident, a youth, who was trying to cross an unmanned railway crossing on his motor-bike at Koibaazar area under Gauripur police station of Dhubri district, was crushed to death by the Dhubri-Kamakhya train. The youth has been identified as Nurjamal Sheikh.

Tragic re-run: 3 killed in landslide

Three including two minor boys were buried alive in yet another incident of landslide that struck at a hillock in Guwahati on Friday. The incident took place at Lalunggaon in Gorchuk in the wee hours when the victims were in deep sleep. Land from the nearby collapsed the house in which they have been living in for the last six years. Local residents came to know the incident only a few hours later. They dug out the bodies and rescued others.

Price rise: BJP raises voice of protest

Hundreds of BJP activists on Friday joined the nationwide protest against the recent hike in petroleum products and inflation and participate in the 'Jail Bharo' agitation. More than twenty thousand party workers, led by party MPs and MLAs, courted arrested in the district and sub-divisional headquarters of the state. In Guwahati, party national Vice President and Guwahati Lok Sabha MP Bijoya Chakraborty led the protests and courted arrest.

NHRC’s compensation order to Dispur

National Human Rights Commission has asked Dispur to compensate the next of kin of five persons killed in an encounter with security forces on June 2009 in the state with Rs 25,000. On the basis of the post mortem and magisterial inquiry reports, and other materials on record the Commission observed that the killings were an execution and not an encounter and a criminal and grievous violation of human rights. Five people - Allauddin, Sahjamal Hoque, Promtone Sangma, Jahangir and Salim Khan - were killed on June 20, 2009 in Dohikata Kadaldhowa reserve forest during a joint operation of Assam Police, Army and CRPF. The Commission had registered a case on an intimation, received from ADGP,...

Assamese scientist in Stanford forwards cancer research

Altruism has been reported among bacterial population and among humans and other animals, like monkeys, and elephants. But in mammalian cells at the cellular level the idea of altruism has never been described before. Fortunately Mr Bikul Das an Indian (Assamese) scientist who is doing his research at Stanford University School of Medicine has just found that altruism is far more common in Homo sapiens, and goes right down to our cells. Cancer cell is considered as a disease of cellular evolution to reach a state of self sufficiency and immortality. The final stage of these evolution is the appearance of aggressive and metastatic cancer cells. These aggressive cancer cells exhibit some...

Ambubachi Mela to begin on Friday

Kamakhya Temple is all abuzz. Ambubachi Mela is set to begin from Friday. Thousands of pilgrims are pouring in the must –visit spot atop the beautiful Nilachal hill to attend the four-day religious festival. Security has been beefed up in the entire Nilachal Hills stretch with more than 500 policemen and some 150 NCC cadets have been called in for maintaining law and order at the shrine during the festival. Apart from this, paramilitary forces have also been given responsibility to carry out round-the-clock checking.