Thiruvananthapuram, Sep 21 (IANS) Malayalam children's film director Majid Gulistan is seeking legal recourse for his film being allegedly ignored, first at the state level awards and then at last week's national awards.

Addressing reporters here Gulistan said that he has already finished consultations with his legal counsel and a petition would be filed against the foul play by certain bigwigs in the industry to sideline his film "Chithrakuzhal".

"The rules at both the state and national level film awards are abundantly clear that no dubbed, revised or remade version of an earlier film can contest for the awards.

"Kesu", a Malayalam children's film had won both the state and the national awards and this was a remake of an earlier film "Pularvattom" of Harikumar, said Gulistan.

Harikumar, who was a jury member at the National Film Awards, has openly said that "Kesu" was just the same as his film released in 2002, said Gulistan, a student of the Adyar Film Institute.

"Kesu" is directed by Sivan, father of acclaimed film personality Santosh Sivan.

"Everyone knows the clout of Sivan and another son of his, Sanjeev Sivan, who was a regional jury member. He was placed there to block my film," Gulistan said.

"Their objective was fulfilled and my film 'Chithrakuzhal' failed to reach the national jury," said Gulistan, a state award winner and producer of 30 film documentaries.

"Kesu" ran into a controversy last week when Harikumar reportedly said that if not for him the film would not have won an award. He earlier said that the film was just a remake of his own film.

"Sanjeev Sivan's credentials to be part of the regional jury has to be proved. The normal understanding is that to be part of a jury, the person should be a national award winner, or should be a person of excellence form the art and literary field. Sanjeev has neither of these and he was placed in the jury because of his father," said Majid.

But Sanjeev told IANS that everything was done in a transparent manner.

"There have been a lot of films made on the Bible, people interpret various angles when a film is made. Eminent film maker Sai Paranjpye who headed the last state film award jury said that there could be several interpretations and hence it was tenable and that's how " Kesu" won the award at the state level," said Sanjeev.

Gulistan's "Chithrakuzhal" is being released next month.

Kerala Forest Minister Binoy Viswan who saw the preview show of the film said that it is a good children's film.

"The film is certainly a sincere attempt to tell about the environment and forests. Commercially, I do not know what its fate would be, but I would credit those behind the film for coming out with such a topic," said Viswan.