Out of the wilderness?
Giving a boost to the emerging talent in wildlife filmmaking in India, the United Kingdom (U.K.) has announced the Environment Film Fellowships for 2006.
Announcing the names of seven winners, British High Commissioner to India, Sir Michael Arthur said, "Through this collaborative endeavour between the U.K. and Indian filmmakers we hope to address the larger issues of conservation of some of the rarest species."
Worth Rs.6 lakhs, the fellowship requires the filmmakers to complete the films by December 2006. The films will be aired on Discovery Channel and would also be screened at the Wildscreen Festival in India, scheduled to be held in January 2007.
Each winner has collaborated with an expert in the respective field and with the theme being `wildlife crime,' the brief includes bringing out how and why these rare species, all of which figure in Schedule I of the Wildlife Protection Act, are being poached.
For instance, Sonya V. Kapoor is working on the poaching of butterflies.
For Delhi-based Kalpana Subramanium, the challenge is to bring turtles into focus through her film `Turtles in a Soup.' Similarly, Ashima Narain is working on how the Indian sloth bear, which enjoys the same rank as the tiger under the law, is being blatantly poached and traded. The others include Gurmeet Sapal on leopards, Himanshu Malhotra on corals, Jay Mazumdar on tiger poaching and Balan on domestic and wild elephants of Kerala.
ANUJ KUMAR
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