Odisha Film Awards Case: Unable To Ascertain Plagiarism, Jury Panel Tells HC

Bhubaneswar: Even as the Orissa High Court is scheduled to hold the final hearing of the case related to the state film awards on January 17, the jury committee formed by the state government for a fresh evaluation of entries has expressed its inability to ascertain whether the Odia films ‘Khusi’ and ‘Golmal Love’ are remakes of foreign films.

The government had formed the jury committee for evaluation of entries for the 31st Odisha State Film Awards-2019 afresh on the direction of the High Court. A single judge bench of the court, headed by Justice Arindam Sinha, had given the direction and issued a stay order on award presentation on December 13 last year.

The bench issued the order after hearing a petition filed by Odia film-maker Bobby Islam challenging the selection list. Justice Sinha had also directed the state government to evaluate afresh all the entries received for the awards.

In his petition, Bobby alleged that the film ‘Khusi’ is a remake of the Korean film ‘Hope’ and the jury had selected it for the awards in best actor, best actress, best editor and best child artiste categories. The film ‘Golmal Love’ selected for the award in the best comedy artiste category is a copy of ‘Carry on Jatta’,  a Punjabi film.

In its report submitted to the court on Tuesday, the committee said the producers of the disputed films ‘Khusi’ and ‘Golmal Love’ had submitted a declaration that their films are original work and not copied/remade from any other films. Hence, the committee has no role to play in this regard, it stated.

“Every year, thousands of films are being produced globally in various languages, regions and there is no mechanism available to detect any kind of plagiarism in film productions. In this case, it is beyond the capability of the committee members to find out whether the films ‘Khusi’ or ‘Golmal Love’ are imitations of films of any other country or state,” TNIE quoted the report as stating.

After hearing the jury committee, Justice Sinha scheduled next hearing on January 17 and asked the petitioner to file a reply, if any, by the next date.