Divvy Kant Upadhyay, Manipal
Daijiworld Media Network - Udupi (GA)
 
Udupi, Mar 23: On a day when the region witnessed the shocking inhuman act of a disabled man being forcibly alighted from a bus by the bus conductor at Padil in Mangalore, heart-rending documentaries on disability issues drew emotive responses from the audience at the two-day film festival organized by the Manipal Institute of Communications (MIC), Manipal. The event that concluded on Saturday delivered a strong message ‘to create opportunities rather than offer sympathies’ for the disabled.                                                                     
‘Dignity and Justice for All’ was the theme of the Pan-India traveling ‘We Care’ Film Festival organized by an NGO ‘Brotherhood’. The festival marks the 60th year of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and is supported by the United Nations Information Centre and the National Trust.
 
Founder-director of ‘Brotherhood’, Satish Kapoor, speaking to Daijiworld explained that there were movies under the categories of 1 mintue, 5 minutes, 20 minutes and 60 minutes durations. “The traveling film festival aims to rate these documentaries based on audience evaluations and feedback” said Kapoor. Students of Journalism and Mass Communications from MIC along with medical interns from the Department of Community Medicine at KMC Manipal watched and rated the documentaries.

One of the entries in the festival is a 5-minute film on special children titled ‘The End of a Rainbow’ made by a group of MIC students led by Joanne Rodrigues and Nida Unas. The film was shot and based on the special needs children studying at ‘Manasa’- a school for such children located at Pamboor near here. The team that made the movie, informed that the film has already won an award and a sum of 10,000rs which was donated to Manasa.
 
A media workshop was conducted on the subject of filming on ‘disability issues’ by Kannan from Plan-International forum. Kannan conveyed that the main objective of the film festival was not to evoke pity or sympathy, but to create awareness about the rights of disabled. He opined that “though certain NGOs have moved ahead to address the rehabilitation issues, the media has not caught up with the change and still portrays disability issues with the emotional angle.” MIC Manipal Director Dr MV Kamath inaugurated the film festival and senior lecturer at MIC, P Subrahmaniam along with his students coordinated the two-day programme.
 
Few Popular movies at the film fest:
 
1. I-M-Possible - One min Indian film by Ch. Inaobi based on Cerebral Palsy.
 
2. The End of a Rainbow - Multiple Disabilities - Indian film by MIC students Joanne Rodrigues and Nida Unas
 
3. Bilal - 55 min Indian Film by saurav Sarangi (Film about three year old Bilal who can see but his parents cannot as they are blind. Bilal hardly undersatnds what blindness means. Inside a tiny dark room, Bilal and his little brother Hamza and their parents live playing a curious game of seeing and not seeing. The film captures the unusual story of the boy observing him over a year in his rare moments of sharing love, fun, cruelty and hope.)
 
4. Shining Stars - 60 minutes Israeli film by Yael Kipper on Physical handicap
 
5. Deaf: Hear Me! , 38 minutes Indian film on deafness by carol Duffy Clay