Pankaj butalia biography channel

Butalia’s films have been screened extensively throughout the world and his 1993 film Moksha has also won several international awards. In the city on the invitation of the Chandigarh Creative Cinema Circle Butalia shares his journey.

He claims that his career can be summed up in a twenty 20 format, “I played as a national player for 20 years , taught in Delhi university for an equal span and now I am into film making for twenty years. You see, with 20 years in the same vocation, you experience a monotony” says Butalia.

Saying that documentary filmmaking must be theme oriented for Butalia it is by and large a solo project execution as he strives to translate his own perceptions of a theme on to celluloid.

“My film ‘Manipur song’ based on the rape tragedy of Assam is in fact homage to womanhood. But instead of direct references I have structured the film under different heads like Violence, Manipur Diaspora, drug addiction, collateral harm and interview of the victim. The film was telecast by NDTV with certain aberrations” disclosed Butalia.

“My new films deal with the depression of people in Kashmir and Assam besides showcasing the literary genius of Nida Fazli, eminent Bollywood lyricist” says Butalia.

Another film by him ’Karvaan’ ( Shades of Darkness) featuring Naseeruddin Shah and Kitu Gidwani deals with the Partition of India and its aftermath in both India and Pakistan, “There were several budding actors for whom forgetting their lines and not portraying specified emotional expressions was a routine but hats off to Naseeruddin Shah who always came fully prepared and never faltered” claims

Speaker:

The award-winning Delhi-based film-maker, Pankaj Butalia, will offer a selective screening and discussion of one of his three recent documentary films concerned with the consequences of violence in the embattled border regions of North and Northeast India. The film-- Manipur Song (2009), is concerned with the crises of militarized violence and dispossession of ordinary lives in Manipur.Manipur Song61 minutes 2009 - DocumentarySet in Manipur the film seeks to foreground a state that exists on the periphery of the Indian imagination.As with other North Eastern states, culturally and ethnically Manipur has remained estranged from the dominant Indian culture and has repeatedly sought to assert its identity through insurgency. In 1980-81 the Indian state countered by giving unprecedented powers to its army to deal with insurgency. The 'Armed Forces Special Powers Act' (AFSPA), gives complete immunity to the army and led to killings and rapes. The situation got so bad that in August 2004 a group of women disrobed in front of the army barracksholding banners saying 'Indian Army Rape Us'.