Payback Time

While awards come dime a dozen these days,the Ananya Samman,organized by the Bengali news channel 24 Ghonta managed to break a few clichés. With the aim to recognize those ‘who have made a difference’,the awards applauded both the celebrities and their not-so-celebrated yet courageous counterparts from the masses. The ceremony,which was attended by the likes of chief minister Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee,theatre veteran Girish Karnad etc saw stalwarts from several fields being applauded for their work. One of them being filmmaker Mrinal Sen.

Music maestros Pt Ajoy Chakraborty,Ustad Rashid Khan,Pt Anindo Chatterjee and Pt Tejendra Narayan Majumdar paid a stirring tribute to sarod maestro Ustad Ali Akbar Khan,who passed away a few days ago at San Francisco.

The awards also recognized the works of ‘unsung heroes’ — social reformers who have quietly carried on with their work trying to bring substantial changes to out society and culture.