Karimnagar, April 11: Aval, a Tamil short film and Niyamgiri, an Oriya documentary film bagged first prize at Palapitta Awards-2011.
The awards were given at the concluding ceremony of the three-day National Short and Documentary Film Festival held here on Sunday.
Telugu short film, Mali Sandhya Velalo, and documentary film, Veli Prema, bagged the second prizes while Life@Charminar won the special jury award in the documentary category.
Information and Public Relations commissioner C Parthasarathi gave away the awards to the directors of the films.
He called upon the youth to opt for film-making as a career as there were a lot of opportunities in the field.
“Films are a powerful media having great impact on the society,” he said.
He expressed happiness that youth were making short films as a hobby and uploading them on social network sites like Facebook and You Tube.
He said that film clubs have been set up in about 15 degree colleges across the state to encourage youth towards making films.
Presently, the clubs are running in colleges in Vijayawada, Vizianagaram, Tirupati, Warangal and Karimnagar, he informed and added that such clubs would be set up in many other educational institutions soon.
About 48 short and documentary films were screened in the three-day festival.
There has been overwhelming response for the festival, claimed Karimnagar film society president Ravikanti Murali.
Jury committee chairman Ram Mohan Naidu, members Ashok Kumar and Mamidi Harikrishna, festival committee general secretary Syed Muzaffar, advisers N Srinivas, Ramulu, DPRO D Srinivas, executive committee members and film buffs were present.
–Agencies