Five short films on child rights awarded

Odisha Channel Bureau Bhubaneswar, Mar 21: Five short films were awarded as winners of ‘Kallola’ short film contest on child rights at a ceremony held here on Friday.The awards were presented by Odisha Governor S.C.Jamir.‘The Voice’ by Santosh Panda on child sexual abuse, received the 1st prize, while ‘Building Knowledge’ by Soham Dutta on child labour won the 2nd Prize.‘So Sweet of You’ by The Mantrra on child labour received the 3rd Prize, the Jury’s Choice award went to ‘Chotu’ by Biswajit Kuldi, and the Children’s Choice award went to ‘The Right Glass’ by Biswanath Rath.Speaking on the occasion, Yumi Bae, Chief, UNICEF Odisha said, “These short films remind us of the inviolable human rights that each and every child is born with and the responsibility that each of us, as a member of family, community and society have in ensuring that no child is denied his or her basic rights.”Sharing her thoughts on the occasion, Sneha Mishra, Secretary, AAINA said, “Through the medium of this contest we hope the creative minds will find a sensitized way to present the issue which will have impact on the community to enable a better and safe society for the children.The films will be used to further sensitize larger audiences and generate discussion and debate around this issue.”Kallola, launched in October 2014 invited entries from professional and amateur filmmakers.It received 27 entries in 30, 60 and 90 seconds’ duration. The theme for this year was ‘Ending Violence against Children’ with four sub themes: Child Labour, Child Sexual Abuse, Child Marriage and Corporal Punishment.Interested participants were invited to visit the microsite developed for contest: http://kallola.aaina.org.in to familiarise themselves with the themes and rules of the contest.A short workshop for filmmakers on communicating issues through short films was held in November 2014.An eminent Jury panel comprising of Anant Mahapatra, Lalatendu Rath, Batakrushna Tripathy, Raju Raman, Birendra Das, Sampad Mohapatra and Manipadma Jena along with a special panel of children Jury from five different schools and student representatives from different districts evaluated the entries and selected the winners.