Odia short film ‘Mask’ directed by senior officer of the Odisha Administrative Service (OAS) Sweta Kumar Dash won the International People’s Choice Award at the Quarantine Image Film Festival-2020 in Argentina.
Among 3,000 entries, the jury members adjudged ‘Mask’ as the best awareness film on COVID-19.
The 7-minute film revolves around the struggle of a poor boy who sells hand-made masks prepared by his mother to sustain a livelihood for his family amid the Covid-19 pandemic. The film also showed the reluctance of people to purchase them due to the low price.
The film was also officially selected for the finals in the 9th Mumbai Short International Film Festival 2020 held in Mumbai on December 6, 2020. The film was selected as an official entry for the finals in the shortest film category in the Film Festival of India, 2020.
Sweta Dash, working as SDM in Odisha’s revenue department, who is now on a four-month deputation to Ganjam district for Covid duty, managed to find time during leisure to prepare the script and direct the movie. Dash, the creative director of the film “Delhi Bus” based on ‘Nirbhaya Case’, had also partnered in writing the screenplay and dialogue of that film.
