The Hindu : Karnataka / Bangalore News : `Mithakshara' revisited

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Saturday, Apr 29, 2006

Karnataka

Karnataka - Bangalore

`Mithakshara' revisited

Staff Reporter

Shivanand Bekal

Bangalore: Shivanand Bekal has won first prize at the South Zone Doordarshan Award for Kannada documentaries. Now an assistant director at the Gulbarga Doordarshan Kenrda, his film was on Sri Vignaneswara, the author of "Mithakshara".

He wrote, directed and produced the documentary about the 12th Century writer Vignaneswara, who wrote the principles on Hindu succession law.

Patronised by Chalukya King Vikramaditya VI, Vignaneshwara left behind inscriptions about the law and they became the basis for the Hindu family laws, later encoded. His birthplace in Gulbarga has been declared a national monument.

The documentary has eminent persons such as the former Governor and jurist Rama Jois, Karnataka Governor T.N. Chaturvedi, the former Supreme Court judge Shivaraj Patil and the former Union Information Minister Ravishankar appearing to talk about the "Mithakshara" school of succession and about Vignaneswara and his times.

This is not Bekal's first venture in producing documentaries; he produced "Vignana Vishwa", a film that won an award in 1998 at the All India Akashawani Annual Day. The present award comes with a citation and cash prize of Rs. 15,000.

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