“I did not want to receive the National Award from a BJP Minister”: Aneez K Mappila

The 65^th National Film Awards ceremony, held on 3 May 2018 at Vigyan Bhavan, New Delhi, witnessed a mass boycott by filmmakers and artists when it was announced that the awards will be distributed by the Information and Broadcasting Minister, Smriti Irani, instead of the President, a tradition that has been unbroken for 65 years. Newsclick and The Indian Writers’ Forum spoke to Aneez K Mappila, director of The Slave Genesis, which won a National Film Award for the Best Anthropological Documentary. He was one of the 66 people who boycotted the award ceremony.