Siddhartha Gautam Film Festival 2010 - Orissa Leg: Final Announcement
Biswa Pattanayak
Siddhartha Gautam Film Festival 2010 – ORISSA LEG:
FINAL announcement: ENTRIES CLOSE AUGUST 18, 2010
Siddhartha Gautam Film Festival welcomes entries for the Orissa chapter of its sixth edition! The festival will be held in Bhubaneswar, and then go “mobile” to other venues in the state in early September 2010. The festival will also include the announcement of SAATHII Rainbow Film Awards 2010. It is being organized by Sampark, a civil society advocacy forum to advance the health and rights of sexual minorities and people living with HIV (PLHIV) in Orissa.
Siddhartha Gautam and the film festival: The festival is organized annually in memory of the pioneering activist Siddhartha Gautam and seeks to generate awareness and dialogue on gender, sexuality, HIV, sexual and reproductive health, and human rights issues. Siddhartha was a lawyer and human rights activist and worked on a variety of issues related to discrimination against vulnerable groups of people in India. He was one of the first persons in India to talk about sexuality and HIV/AIDS as human rights issues, and started AIDS Bhedbhav Virodhi Andolan, the first Indian AIDS activist group, in New Delhi in 1989-90.
The event is an effort to continue Siddhartha’s engagement with human rights issues, and through it, pay tribute to his vision and spirit. It is a humble contribution to remember and take forward the pioneering work done by Siddhartha to promote and protect the rights of sexual minorities and PLHIV. In particular, the film festival tries to support and encourage Indian filmmakers, films produced in India and those that focus on the Indian, Indian Diaspora and South Asian contexts.
Film festival history: The festival was first organized in Kolkata in 2003 by SAATHII (also a member and secretariat of Sampark) and its partner agencies. It was inspired by a similar festival organized by The Friends of Siddhartha group in New Delhi each year from 1993 to 2003. Over the years, the festival has become a multi-venue, weeklong event that reaches out to audiences in both urban and rural areas in West Bengal and Orissa. It made a debut in Orissa in 2007 – in Bhadrak district, the first ever venue for the festival outside West Bengal and where SAATHII started mobile film shows, adding another innovation to the festival agenda.
Film festival theme: This year the festival will aim to highlight and support legal efforts to protect the rights of PLHIV and decriminalize same-sex love and sexual minorities in India. The films will be seen by a diverse audience of lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, inter-sexed, Kothi and Hijra individuals; people infected or affected by HIV; social workers; health care providers; government officials; college and university students; and media persons. Families and friends of sexual minorities and PLHIV will be especially welcome.
SAATHII Rainbow Film Awards 2010: We are also happy to announce the 3rd edition of the SAATHII Rainbow Film Awards. Initiated in 2005, this award is the first of its kind in India that honours Indian films portraying sexual minorities, their health and development concerns, and actors in the roles of sexual minority characters. The main aim of the award is to make the “voices of sexual minorities” heard by filmmakers and convey the message that sexual minorities have an opinion on the films that portray them. These opinions should be taken seriously by the filmmakers and other artists involved in the making of films, so that the portrayal of sexual minorities becomes more sensitive and mature.
This year the award will be decided by a five-member jury of sexual minority and PLHIV community leaders, health and development workers, and media experts. The award winners will be given a trophy depicting the “rainbow of human sexuality”. The awards will be announced in three categories:
· Best feature film portraying sexual minority characters and issues
· Best feature film actor in the role of a sexual minority character
· Best documentary film focussing on sexual minority issues
Films produced in India and released in the period May 2007 to July 2010 will be eligible for the awards. Films in any genre (shorts, documentaries, docu-features, feature films and music videos) and in any Indian language with English sub-titles will be eligible. The decisions on the awards will be taken at least a week prior to the film festival, but the awards are likely to be announced on the final day of the festival in Bhubaneswar. The names of the jury members will also be made known on that day.
Note: Given that the filmmakers participating in the awards may include SAATHII representatives or films to be considered for the awards may include SAATHII representatives as actors, no SAATHII Trustee or full-time / part time staff member of SAATHII will be part of the jury to avoid conflict of interest.
Call for entries for general screening and awards: Filmmakers interested in participating are requested to send their films with the following details:
a) Format: DVD formats (compatible with Indian systems)
b) Documents : (i) Letter mentioning permission for general screening and, if applicable, willingness to participate in the SAATHII Rainbow Film Awards; (ii) Film synopsis (film title, genre, production / release year, duration, director and producers’ names, film summary and filmmaker profile summary); and (iii) Full contact information (e-mail, phone, postal address)
c) Still images: Please submit one or two digital stills from the film, or computer soft copy of the film DVD cover
We will also be approaching a number of filmmakers whose productions are already available in SAATHII’s reference libraries in Kolkata and Bhubaneswar.
Please note that there is no entry fee for participation. All films – whether for general screening or the awards section – will be subject to selection by the Film Festival Organizing Committee. Unless otherwise indicated, all films submitted will be included in SAATHII’s reference libraries which together constitute one of the largest resources in eastern India for material on sexual and reproductive health, HIV and human rights.
Deadline for submission of films: August 18, 2010
Details of the film festival programme will be announced in the coming days on the SAATHII website (www.saathii.org), e-forums, social networking Internet sites like Facebook and on posters to be displayed in educational institutions and popular book stores in Bhubaneswar.
Films need to be submitted to: Biswa Bhusan Pattanayak, Campaign Development Coordinator, SAATHII, N-3/301, IRC Village, Nayapalli, Bhubaneswar, Pin 751 015, Orissa, India.
For enquiries: Phone: 0674 255 2845 (SAATHII), 0 93380 47384 (Biswa Bhusan Pattanayak), 0 98312 88023 (Pawan Dhall). E-mail: saa...@yahoo.com
In solidarity: K. Santosh Kumar (INP+), Pravahsini Pradhan (KNP+), Sashikanta Malik (Action Aid), Biswa Bhusan Pattanayak, Dr. Mitali Mohanty and Pawan Dhall (SAATHII) – On behalf of the Film Festival Organizing Committee and Sampark coalition.
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About SAATHII and Sampark: SAATHII is a registered non-profit organization that strengthens HIV prevention, care, support, treatment and associated gender, sexuality, human rights and sexual and reproductive health initiatives in India. Sampark is a civil society coalition for advocacy and capacity building of sexual minorities and PLHIV in Orissa to advance their health and rights. Sampark, an initiative of SAATHII, was formed in March 2009 through a project titled “Building the Capacity of People Living with HIV and Sexual Minorities in Orissa and West Bengal to Advance their Health and Rights”. This initiative was undertaken in technical partnership with Interact Worldwide, London and with funding support from Department for International Development – Civil Society Challenge Fund, Glasgow.
Regards
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Biswa Bhusan Pattanayak