Paras Ra­moutar

To mark the end of the 150th birth an­niver­sary of In­di­an po­et lau­re­ate, Ra­bindranath Tagore, the Uni­ver­si­ty of the West In­dies (UWI) will host a film fes­ti­val to mark the oc­ca­sion. The Tagore Film Fes­ti­val is be­ing host­ed in col­lab­o­ra­tion with the High Com­mis­sion of In­dia and the Ma­hat­ma Sand­hi In­sti­tute for Cul­tur­al Co-op­er­a­tion. The screen­ing be­gan at the School of Ed­u­ca­tion au­di­to­ri­um at the UWI St Au­gus­tine cam­pus yes­ter­day and con­tin­ues to­day, May 5, 6 and 7. Films start at 5.30 pm. The pub­lic is in­vit­ed, and ad­mis­sion is free. The fes­ti­val will fea­ture a ret­ro­spec­tive of In­di­an films based on nov­els writ­ten by Tagore. Among these are adap­ta­tions by renowned In­di­an film­mak­er Satya­jit Ray, in­clud­ing Charu­la­ta, Kab­u­li­wala, Khu­di­to Pashan, Teen Kanyan and Char Ad­hyay.

Tagore's work will be cel­e­brat­ed world­wide, and this is an ef­fort by the In­di­an Gov­ern­ment to raise glob­al aware­ness of this cru­cial fig­ure in In­di­an his­to­ry and cul­ture. Tagore was a Ben­gali whose knowl­edge and ex­per­tise spanned var­i­ous dis­ci­plines. In 1913, he be­came the first non-Eu­ro­pean to win the No­bel Prize for lit­er­a­ture. He was al­so in­volved in mu­sic, po­et­ry and the es­tab­lish­ment of the Vis­va-Bharati Uni­ver­si­ty. He al­so mod­ernised Ben­gali art by spurn­ing rigid clas­si­cal forms and re­sist­ing lin­guis­tic stric­tures.

Charu­la­ta, which was re­leased in 1964, won the Sil­ver Bear for Best Di­rec­tor at the 15th Berlin In­ter­na­tion­al Film Fes­ti­val in 1965. It al­so won the Gold­en Award for Best Film at the Na­tion­al Film Awards in the same year. Kab­u­li­wala re­ceived the Na­tion­al Film Award for the Best Film in 1957 and the Sil­ver Bear ex­tra­or­di­nary prize of the ju­ry at the 7th Berlin In­ter­na­tion­al Film Fes­ti­val. Dr Christo­pher Meir, co-or­di­na­tor of the UWI film pro­gramme, said: "This will be a great op­por­tu­ni­ty for the cam­pus com­mu­ni­ty and mem­bers of the pub­lic to learn more about the great achieve­ments of Ra­bindranath Tagore and var­i­ous In­di­an film-mak­ers. We are ho­n­oured to be able to co-host this se­ries with the In­di­an High Com­mis­sion."