National awards for Debajit Changmai and others from Assam

Debajit Changmai of Assam has won national award for the year 2010 for re-recording of the final mixed track of Hindi film ‘Ishqiya’ in the 58th National Film declared in New Delhi. Besides Changmai, ‘Jetuka Pator Dore’ won the Rajat Kamal award for best Assamese film. Altogether six people from the northeast got the award.

Debajit who hails from Sivasagar got the award for merging voices, location ambience, background music and other sound effects to create a near-tactile experience that is both real and artistic.

“I’m extremely happy at this. I always wanted to do something at the national level. I think my hard work paid off. It was a long and hard journey since I landed in Mumbai in the year 2002,” said an ecstatic Debajit from Mumbai.

Meanwhile, Jadumoni Dutta directed ‘Jetuka Pator Dore’ won the Best Assamese film. This time only two entries were there, the other being ‘Jaangfai Joonak’ by Sanjib Sabhapandit.

It was selected for a heart-warming portrayal of the rural landscape with an emphasis on the need for self-reliance in the process of development.

“It is a beautifully made film on the importance of work culture and how collective efforts can do wonders,” said Chandan Sharma, who worked on the subtitles of the film.

Debajit’s success came after another Assamese youth Amrit Pritam won the award last year with Resul Pookutty for Kerala Varma Pazhassi Raja. Debajit happens to be the batch mate of Amrit Pritam at Jyoti Chitraban Film Institute in Guwahati.

“It’s great that one more Assamese technician has won the national award for the second consecutive year working in a film outside. Both are very talented, and it's a great feeling that these two Assamese youngsters have won national awards one after the other,” said noted film critic Utpal Borpujari.

“I’m sure more people from Assam in the coming years will win awards for films made outside the region, seeing the way the number of our boys and girls working in the film industry. But I would be happier if they get the opportunity to work in quality Assamese or other ethnic language films from NE and win such top awards for such films,” Borpujari said adding that however, artistic work does not require linguistic or regionalist boundaries, and quality work gets recognized everywhere, as Debajit and Amrit have proved.

But, he expressed concern that compared to the other parts of the country Assamese film industry is lagging far behind.

“There were just two entries from Assam this time – ‘Jetuka Pator Dore’ and ‘Jaangfai Joonak’ -- out of which one got the Rajat Kamal for best Assamese film. It actually reflects the sad scenario of Assamese cinema that the best has to be decided from the two films,” the veteran film critic rued.

“In case of Malayalam or Marathi or Tamil or Bengali films, the best regional language film will have to be decided from among probably at least 30-40 films,” he further said.