TNI Bureau: The Orissa High Court quashed the list of awardees for the 31st Odisha State Film Awards, 2019 and ordered publication of fresh award list in a month.
A Single Judge Bench of Dr. Justice Sanjeeb Kumar Panigrahi, after verifying, quashed the award list on the ground that two films – “KHUSI” & “GOLMAL LOVE” – were found to be placed in the list in utter violation of the Odisha State Films Awards rules.
The bench discovered these movies plagiarised and copied from films of other languages and thus, observed: “After ocular verification of the films, it appears that the two films, i.e., “KHUSI” & “GOLMAL LOVE” are heavily inspired from the alleged non-Odia films at least. Considering a comparison of the impugned films with the plot and scenes in the Korean film ‘HOPE’ and Punjabi film “CARRY ON JATTA”, it is clear that from the plethora of facts, circumstances and stated overlap that the impugned motion films are uncredited remakes of the aforementioned non-Odia films.”
It is to be noted here that an advertisement was notified on the website of the Department of Odia Culture inviting applications for 31st Odisha State Film Awards, 2019 against 27 categories and 8th Odisha State Tele Awards, 2019 against 20 categories by 20.02.2021.
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Applications were submitted for the aforesaid categories and the final list of awardees was published after due verification by the jury,
However, upon seeing the award list, the petitioner found various irregularities in the awards announced in 27 categories which were in apparent violation of Odisha State Film Award Rules, 2010.
The petitioner alleged that many of the films that featured in the final award list were remakes of some films made in other languages, which should not have qualified for the nomination itself for lack of originality. Thus, he filed this writ petition challenging the same.
Accordingly, the Court concluded that the impugned award list should be ‘trashed’ and a fresh list must be made, in consonance with the Rules governing the activity.
The court also directed to eliminate ‘Khusi’ and ‘Golmal Love’ movies from all categories of awards while preparing the new list.
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