Pauli Dam gets busy
Television-star-turned-film-actor Pauli Dam is going places. After a brilliant performance in the classic role of Madhurilata in Gautam Ghoshe’s Kaalbela, the talented actor is being flooded with roles left, right and centre. The roles are no duplication of Madhurilata so Pauli has no chance of getting stereotyped. Among her current large-screen assignments are Sisir Sahana's Mati-O-Manush where she plays a rustic village girl and Sudipto Ghatak-Ajay Singh's Alive in which she plays a CID officer having an extra-marital affair with a character being played by veteran Sabyasachi Chakraborty. She is playing a challenging role in Mumbai-based Sundando Mitra's yet-to-be-titled film. “It is really funny because I am pitted against one of my favourite actors Sabyasachi (Benuda) in two films in two very different situations. In Mati-O-Manush, Benuda plays my father while in Alive, he is my lover,” she says.

Tapan Sinha, Nabyendu Chatterji remembered
Nandan and Cine Central jointly organised a condolence meeting to mourn the demise of two stalwarts of Bengali cinema, namely Tapan Sinha and Nabyendu Chatterjee. Present at the meeting were filmmakers representing three generations - Mrinal Sen, Tarun Majumdar and Gautam Ghose. Eminent members of Cine Central and Nandan, namely Justice Shyamal Sen and Nandan CEO Neelanjan Chatterjee, were also present. Sen lamented the passing away of Chatterjee, who is his junior in age and in seniority in the industry and talked about the low profile Tapan Sinha's rich contribution to Bengali cinema, extolling the virtues of two filmmakers whose approach, treatment and genres were different, but who, in their own way, made their presence felt with their personal style and presentation. Majumdar grieved over the fact that they do not make filmmakers like Sinha and Chatterjee any more while Ghosh felt that it was now left to the younger generation of filmmakers to carry the torch of good cinema forward.

World’s youngest film director bags award
13-year old Master Kishan, the world’s youngest director and Guinness world-record holder was awarded the National Child Award 2008 in the field of Arts (Motion Pictures) for his upcoming film Care Of Footpath at the hands of UPA Chairperson Sonia Gandhi at Vigyan Bhavan, New Delhi. The reorganisation has come from The Ministry of Women and Child Development. The film stars Jackie Shroff, Saurav Shukla and National Award-winning Kannada actor Tara.
According to Kishan, “This film is dedicated for all underprivileged children on the earth. The film is called Care Of Footpath because it’s about street children whose only homes are the footpaths of India’s big cities.”

Master Kishan had recently been awarded the Swarna Kamal National Award for directing the Best Children film Care Of Footpath for articulating the burning desire for education in a slum dweller. The film is about an orphan slum boy who wants to go to school and make it big in life and faces several challenges to achieve it.
Besides many international awards, Kishan had also won Telephono Azzuro’s ‘Children Rights Award’ at the Giffoni International Film Festival - Italy 2007. It’s also treated at Oscar for Children. Acquired by Aron Govil Productions Inc. of New York, USA Care Of Footpath will release worldwide soon.

Veteran Telugu actress Nirmalamma no more
Veteran Telugu actress Nirmalamma, who essayed the character of grandmother in several films, died in Hyderabad on February 19 following brief illness. She was 89. Nirmalamma, who was suffering from age-related ailments, breathed her last during her sleep, her family members said. She started her career in early 1950s and acted in about 800 films, including some in Tamil.
Born as Rajamani at Machilipatnam in Krishna district, she acted as grandmother to all the leading heroes including Chiranjeevi, Nagarjuna and Venkatesh. Her portrayal of grandmother in Chiranjeevi’s Gang Leader was much appreciated by the audience. Expressing deep sorrow over the demise of Nirmalamma, Chiranjeevi, who is on a road show in Kurnool district, said that she was a natural actress. Several other film personalities also condoled her death.