My Mother’s Girlfriend, Testimony of Ana, At Home Walking win top awards at IDSFFK

The 13th International Documentary and Short Film Festival of Kerala (IDSFFK) was organised in Thiruvananthapuram from 9 to 14 December 2021. Organized by the Kerala State Chalachitra Academy for the Kerala government's department of cultural affairs as part of its endeavour to catalyze a vibrant documentary and short film movement, the festival presented a series of awards and citations.

The fiction jury committee comprises Leena Yadav, Rajesh Rajamani and Christo Tomy; and the award for the Best Campus Film produced within Kerala, which carries a cash award of Rs50,000 and certificates for the creative team, was jointly awarded to Burn directed by Mac Mer and Unseen Voices directed by Raj Govind.

The Best Short Fiction award was presented to Mazhya Aaichi Girlfriend (My Mother's Girlfriend) directed by Arun Fulara. The Indo-UK-German co-production tells the story of two working-class women who fall in love with each other. Fulara said, “I am absolutely thrilled to win at a festival that has such a great lineage and pedigree of films and filmmakers they’ve championed over the years. The KASHISH QDrishti Film Grant was a huge vote of confidence and gave us the belief and strength to start working on the film even as the pandemic raged around us. More than the money, the continuous support and feedback provided by Neeraj and the team at KASHISH including Sridhar and Saagar have been a huge source of strength to me and the team. This film has reinforced my belief that if you set out to do something good with clean intentions, the right people will come along to make your dream a reality."

The non-fiction jury committee comprised Iffat Fatima, Shabnam Sukhdev and Lalit Vachani; and the Best Short Documentary award was presented to Testimony of Ana directed by Sachin Dheeraj Mudigonda. The film is a story of a victim of a witchhunt who has endured societal abuse and violence. Rajula Shah’s Chalo Sakha Us Des Mein (At Home Walking) was awarded the Best Long Documentary award.

The Navroze Contractor Award for Best Documentary Cinematography was presented to Nikhil S Praveen for Eyes on their Fingertips, directed by Muhammed Thalhath M and the Kumar Talkies Award for Best Editing in Long Documentary was awarded to Rituparna Saha for A Bid for Bengal directed by Dwaipayan Banerjee and Kasturi Basu.