TIFF-2022 award for documentary on Ravish Kumar
New Delhi: ‘While We Watched’, the 94-minute Hindi documentary by award-winning filmmaker Vinay Shukla on the professional journey of Magsaysay Award winning Indian journalist Ravish Kumar, won the Amplify Voices Award at the Toronto International Film Festival (TIFF-2022).
‘While We Watched’ – titled ‘Namaskar! Main Ravish Kumar’ in Hindi – was produced by BRITDOC Films and LONO Studio.
A film that focuses on Ravish Kumar’s efforts to uphold facts and truth and simultaneously unveil mere hearsay, ‘While We Watched’ received a standing ovation at the film festival.
TIFF film programmer Thom Powers said that people concerned with the future of television journalism ought to watch the documentary, since, although its tale is situated in India, its reference to putting forth truth fighting the spread of falsehood would be applicable in any country.
Shukla called the feature-length film an expression of his love for journalism. He also called journalists ‘the greatest storytellers of our times’.
Speaking on communicating with Ravish Kumar who won the Ramon Magsaysay Award in 2019, Shukla said that he watched the veteran journalist at work for two years, the way the team ascertained the truth behind a news piece. This, the director said, taught him the efforts put in behind the screen, even every sort of cost the journalist paid, for every news show that a viewer watched. Since he realized it was a tough job, the film was a tribute to the personal cost that journalists pay to get their job right, Shukla stressed.
Luke W Moody, who is one of the producers of the film, called it an effort at bringing to light the loss that the world would face if such quality journalism had to die.
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Congress using hijab issue to pacify minority anger, alleges Karnataka LoP R Ashoka
Bengaluru: Leader of Opposition in the Assembly R. Ashoka has accused the Congress government of using the hijab issue to placate what he described as discontent among minority voters after the Davanagere by-election.
In a post on X on Wednesday, Ashoka alleged that the state government, instead of addressing issues such as price rise, corruption, farmers’ distress and law and order, was attempting to retain its minority vote base by reviving the hijab issue.
Referring to the 2022 dress code introduced by the BJP government, which prohibited hijab in schools and colleges, Ashoka said the Karnataka High Court had upheld the policy and emphasised the importance of discipline in educational institutions.
He questioned the Congress government’s move to revisit the issue and asked whether setting aside the court-backed policy to benefit one community could be described as secularism.
Ashoka further alleged that while the government was willing to permit hijab, it continued to prohibit saffron shawls.
He accused the government of dividing students on religious lines rather than treating schools and colleges as spaces of equality.
Drawing a comparison with Mamata Banerjee’s government in West Bengal, Ashoka claimed that excessive appeasement politics had harmed the state and warned that the Congress in Karnataka could face a similar political response.
He said voters in Karnataka would teach the Congress a lesson for what he termed “vote-bank politics” and for compromising constitutional and judicial principles.
