Chaos mars Film awards

Chaos mars film awards

The Pakistan National Film Awards (PNFA) held after a hiatus of four years at Aiwan-e-Iqbal on Saturday night were marred by chaos. The ceremony, disrupted for some time due to boycott by some leading film personalities for presenting a special award to Meera, was held to honour the best professionals of Lollywood for the year 2002 and 2003.

Besides a number of film personalities, Federal Minister for Culture Ajmal Khan, Special Assistant to CM Punjab Mowahid Hussain and Minister of State Ghulam Bibi Bharwana attended the ceremony.

There were a lot of expectations from the PNFA, which were marred by confusion from the very beginning. The presentation was poor to the point that on numerous occasions, even the guests coming on stage pointed it out. The award presenters at times announced by the anchors Qandeel, Ali Sulman and Sophia Ahmed, were not present. The names were at times not rightly announced and majority of award recipients were not present as well. Senior film artiste of yesteryears Syed Kamal was among the 'advisors' to comperes.

Mustafa Qureshi, Raja Riaz, Farooq Zamir and Raza were the first to boycott the ceremony after Meera received her special 'peace' award. Singer Jawad Ahmed was performing on the stage when the show was hit by disturbance due to a heated debate between Chairman Pakistan Film Producers Association Mian Amjad Farzand and Chairman Pakistan Film Producers Association Ziauddin, organiser of the ceremony. Mian Amjad objected to giving of special award to actress Meera and on declaring her 'pride of the industry'. He alleged that the list of award winners was being altered by Ziauddin on the spot. After about half an hour's pandemonium, Mian Amjad left the hall, and the function resumed. On the request of leading personalities, he came back to the hall. Later, Ziauddin apologised to Mian Amjad.

Jawed Sheikh's super hit film 'Yeh dil aap ka hua' (YDAKH) received 12 awards, including the best film, best director, best music director, best male leading actor (Moammar Rana), best female leading actress (Sana), best editor, best cinematographer and choreographer. Saleem Sheikh, Behroze Subzwari and Nasir Sheikh received most of awards, as other team members were not present.

'Larki Punjaban' bagged seven awards. Shan got the best male leading actor award for 'Commando' (2003). Saima won the best female leading actress award for 'Larki Punjaban'. Papu Samrat and Khanu Samrat got awards for choreography. Lyricist awards went to Rauf Khalid and Nida Pasha, while for cinematography Waqar Bokhari and Ali Jan were honoured. Both art director awards went to Baba Khadim. Sound recordists Zahoor Ahmed and Mahmood Bhatti received awards for sound recording. Shabnum Majeed, Saira Naseem, Ali Haider and Tauseef Dar were the leading playbacks. An award was also announced for comedian Ismail Tara. Journalists Saif Ullah Sipra and Fida Ahmed Kardar also got awards. On protest by Karachi-based journalists, one of them was also given an award.

Lifetime achievement awards were announced for Shaukat Zaman and Badar Munir. Besides Meera, special awards were also given to Indian filmmaker Ram Dyal, Mian Amjad Farzand, and Saleem Swati.

Singers Jawad Ahmed, Waris Baig, Shahida Mini, Zain, Sam and Saira Naseem performed on the occasion. The dance performances of Ahsan Khan and Sherry on song 'Pagal nahin tha' of their film 'Teray bin jiya na jai' and in the end, Meera's livened up the show. Other dance performances were by relatively unknown artistes, like Sania and Sonia. Comedian Amanullah also performed.

In a development on Sunday, Mubasher Lucman said that he was going to formally register his complaint with the Film Producers Association to lodge protest with the Federal Ministry of Culture to take action against Ziauddin for degrading the film industry by poor presentation of the PNFA. He said that he was going to file a lawsuit against Ziauddin for giving statements against him.