67th National Film Awards Postponed Indefinitely Amid COVID-19 Pandemic

With nations across the globe battling against the Novel Coronavirus pandemic, many important events are either getting postponed indefinitely or cancelled. The latest reports state that the National Film Awards, which take place on May 3 every year, stands delayed indefinitely as of now, in the wake of COVID-19 pandemic.

For those who don't know, it was in 2012 that May 3 was announced as the designated date for holding the National Film Awards distribution ceremony every year. May 3 commemorates the day India's first full-length feature film, Dadasaheb Phalke's Raja Harishchandra, was released way back in 1913.

However, this time, the date falls within the lockdown period in the country, owing to the ongoing global crisis.

A source told Hindustan Times that there have been no discussions as of now regarding the annual gala, as officials are currently concentrating, more importantly, on tackling the Novel Coronavirus outbreak.

While there is no official statement on this from the Ministry yet, filmmaker Rahul Rawail, who was the National Film Awards jury head last year, told the tabloid that the process of putting together a jury was "about to start", before the COVID-19 scare took a more serious turn in India.

He was quoted as saying, "The jury itself has not been assembled as yet. And we can't blame the government, as they are trying to do their best and their priorities are much bigger right now. They can't do anything until the lockdown is lifted completely."

Rahul also said that with hardly any movie releases in 2020, he thinks "it won't be fair to have" a National Film Awards next year at all.

"There are no film festivals happening really around the world... I think this year has practically gone off from the calendar as far as the film and TV industry goes. The government is as worried as film people are, but their priorities are different, and (the focus is on) getting things back on track (nationally)... We can't expect the government to stop everything to look after films," he told the leading daily.

Meanwhile, last year, the 66th National Film Awards were delayed because of the general elections. Later, the winners were announced in August and the awards were presented by Vice President Venkaiah Naidu in December.

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