While the newspapers and TV Channels explode with stories of distress and our journey on this planet hurtling towards an abyss of hopelessness, there was an extraordinary story of a glimmer of hope that the Indian ethos of empathy and value of life still exists.
In a corner of The Hindu, in Chennai, there was an Advertisement of significant size, 15 days after the incident, that two bodies of dead people in the recent stampede in the Kumbh Mela remain unclaimed by the relatives. Significant resources must have been spent by the Kumbh Committee to advertise far and wide in all parts of the country to try its best to enable the relatives to claim the bodies.
This sequence a real life incident, reminded me of the similar sequence in 'Aravaan', a Tamil Film, based on Su. Venkatesan's Kaval Kottam which went on to win the Sahitya Academy Award. The concern displayed by the elder in the village and the intense effort to ensure that the dead body to the family of the deceased remain etched in your memory.
Incidentally Su. Venkatesan's play covers 600-700 years of the people who safeguarded the city. Vasanthabalan's effort was to adapt a slice of that history.
What has this got to do with the National Film Awards? I was quite disappointed that such a monumental effort of Vasanthabalan went unrewarded, the sweep and the scope of the epic effort, in terms of adapting such a huge novel is monumental. While OMG was quite enjoyable, the best adapted screenplay should have gone to 'Aravaan'.
I would have also hoped for "Vazahkku Enn 18/9", "Paradesi", "Arohanam", "Eega" and "Gangs of Wasseypur" to win some more awards.
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