Hero of the sea: Chilkuri Sushil Rao’s documentary wins award at 8th Indian World Film Festival

HYDERABAD: Senior Journalist Chilkuri Sushil's documentary "Hero Of The Sea" won an award at the 8th Indian World Film Festival-2024 in Hyderabad on March 10, 2024. The documentary received an 'honourable jury mention' during the awards ceremony.

The documentary focused on the Indian Navy’s firm action against pirates who in recent times have tried to attack ships. The documentary showcased the willpower of five Indians who were taken captive by pirates in Nigeria in 2019, to stay strong and how they survived the ordeal. They were let free only after 70 days with the intervention of the authorities.

More than 200 entries were received for the film festival organised by Noida-based Mumbai Box Office. Out of these 83 were officially selected. From these, the winners were picked by an international jury in various categories including feature films, feature documentaries, short documentaries, animation, documentaries and music videos.

“The Hero Of The Sea” was picked by the jury for an ‘honourable mention award’. The winners in all categories were presented mementos and certificates were presented by D C Singh, chief advisor and Rambhul Singh, film director and founder of Mini Box Office.

This is the eighth year in which the festival was organised in Hyderabad. Throughout the year, film festivals are organised in eight big festivals in different cities in the country with some of them having been organised for the 12th year in succession.

At the awards ceremony, Sushil Rao was also presented with an award that he had won at the 12th Mumbai International Film Festival organsied in December 2023 for documentary “Oscar Challagariga” which got a Special Festival Mention in the festival. A ‘Certificate of Excellence’ was also presented to Sushil Rao for his short documentary entry “Human Feelings in Robot Wars’ which was selected in the 11th Noida International Film Festival-24 held in January.

Daniel Mendoza Leal of Colombia‘ received an award for his Spanish film ‘Matarife La Pelicula’. Emi Ogawa of Japan received two awards that ‘Samurai Tiger’ made by Miyaobi Pictures won at the 11th Noida International Film Festival-24.