ETV Awards for Kannada films

People often think that Kannada film industry is badly ignored on the national scale. In fact, its not just Kannada films but the South Indian cinemas in general. We don't have as many awards as in Hindi - like Film Fare, IIFA, Screen and so many other 'prestigious' awards, which are normally limited to Bollywood cinemas. And normally, they take the lion share even in National Awards. Popularity Awards were never given to any regional language films. This factor evoked ETV and they have come forward to institute 'ETV film awards' for Kannada movies. They have currently identified 15 categories including best film, story/dialogues, director, actor, actress, comedian, music director, best song, editor, lyricist, supporting actor, supporting actress, negative role, male singer and female singer. They may add art director, cinematographer and choreographer to this list.

Their current plan of execution is pretty interesting. This 'by the people, for the people' awards will spread across four quarters of the year. Starting from June 26, they will be opening this polling system to all their viewers who can vote using telephone, SMS and emails. First session of six weeks will list all the movies released during January, February and March this year. And the next session will include April, May and June and so on. The outcome of first session will be presented again for re-filtering during second sessions and so on. That means, the final contestant from each category of first quarter will emerge by the end of second quarter. So, for the final event around Ugadi 2006, four finalists from each category will be in front of the audience. Each quarterly program will take place in places like Mysore, Davanagere, Hasan and Tumakur, while the final event will be held at Bangalore.

Since this is gauged purely based on popularity polling, there are lesser chances for lobbying though is not 100% foolproof. But contrarily, its only the commercial hits that will have better visibility. Chances of films like Beru or Haseena winning the race is very minimal. The other aspect is the reach of films to B and C centers. Many films wont even reach those centers when the poll is on! So there is no question of those viewers participating! ETV also claims that they have lots of viewers even in abroad. But those viewers actively participating in this poll is highly unrealistic as they wont get a chance to see new Kannada films! On the whole, it looks like a poll for urban population. However, its indeed a great move by ETV Kannada to encourage Kannada film professionals. In the past, there were many awards sponsored by private groups and social organizations, which were initiated to fulfill their personal benefits. But they vanished in no time. Unlike those people, lets hope to see ETV grow big in the years to come.