National Film Awards restructured, new categories introduced

Chairman of Expert Committee on National Film Awards Shyam Benegal presenting the report to the Union Minister of Information and Broadcasting, Ambika Soni, in New Delhi on May 11, 2010. Sharmila Tagore and Rajeev Mehrotra are also seen.

The Government has restructured the entire scheme of the National Film Awards, under which there would be a two-tier selection system and some new categories of awards will be introduced.

An official announcement said here today that the selections for National Film Awards for 2009 would be implemented under the new system.

Under the two-tier selection system, five Regional Panels have been constituted for pre-selection of films, as follows:

(i) 5 Regional Panels has been constituted for pre selection of films

(a) North- English, Punjabi, Dogri, Urdu, Bhojpuri, Rajasthani and Central Indian Languages

(b) West- Marathi, Hindi, Gujarati & Konkani

(c ) South I- Tamil and Malayalam

South II - Kannada, Telugu and Tulu

(d) East- Bengali, Assamese, Oriya and dialects spoken in the North-East

The release said each Regional Panel would comprise a Chairperson and one member (both of whom would be from outside the region) and three other members from within the region. The screenings of the Regional Panel as well as the Central jury would be held in Delhi.

The Central Jury would comprise a Chairperson plus ten members, of whom five would be the chairpersons of the five regional juries.

The release said new awards had been introduced for Location Sound Recordist and Sound Designer in the Audiography category, for Background Score in addition to the existing award for Best Music Direction (Songs) and for Adapted Screenplay, Original Screenplay and Dialogues in place of the existing award for Best Screenplay and Dialogues.

The cash prize for several awards in both feature films and non-feature films categories have been increased. The sitting fee of Jury Members has been hiked from Rs.1000 per day to Rs.2500 per day.

The changes have made on the basis of the recommendations by an Expert Committee headed by eminent filmmaker Shyam Benegal for upgradation of the National Film Awards.

The mandate given to the Committee, constituted by the Ministry of Information and Broadcasting was to reinvent the National Film Awards with a view to making them more contemporary and acceptable, the release added.

NNN