{"id":270667,"date":"2025-09-14T00:11:35","date_gmt":"2025-09-13T18:41:35","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/arunachaltimes.in\/?p=270667"},"modified":"2025-09-14T00:11:35","modified_gmt":"2025-09-13T18:41:35","slug":"manisha-halai-wins-prestigious-australian-docu-film-awards","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/arunachaltimes.in\/index.php\/2025\/09\/14\/manisha-halai-wins-prestigious-australian-docu-film-awards\/","title":{"rendered":"Manisha Halai wins prestigious Australian docu-film awards"},"content":{"rendered":"<p style=\"text-align: justify;\">\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\"><strong>ITANAGAR, 13 Sep:<\/strong> Manisha Halai from Arunachal Pradesh won the prestigious Australian International Documentary Conference Award and the Audience Award in Bali, Indonesia, for her debut feature documentary Orange Beetle: Mother &amp; I.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\">She travelled abroad for the first time to participate in the &#8216;Docs by the Sea Storytelling Lab and Pitching Forum&#8217; held at Bali from 4 to 10 September.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\">Halai, currently working as a training assistant with the docu-film training organization Green Hub in Assam&#8217;s Tezpur, is also the first Green Hub\u00a0 fellow to present a film at a global stage.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\">A deeply personal film about her mother, Orange Beetle: Mother &amp; I won the awards out of 292 entries from filmmakers across Asia. It is Halai&#8217;s debut feature documentary and is in the Kaman Mishmi language. The film, currently in its early development stage, is being produced by academy-nominated filmmakers Rintu Thomas and Sushmit Ghosh. It was incubated at the Himalayan Story Lab, the first lab in India for filmmakers from the Himalayan regions of the country.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\">The &#8216;Docs by the Sea Storytelling Lab&#8217; is Asia&#8217;s leading documentary pitching platform, supporting emerging and established filmmakers through mentorship, co-production opportunities, and industry exposure. It brings together independent documentary filmmakers from across Asia to pitch their projects to international producers, mentors, and industry professionals.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\">Director of Green Hub, Rita Banerjee, said: &#8220;Manisha is one of the first Green Hub fellows to pitch her work on a global stage.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\">Halai, a passionate storyteller from remote Kathan village in Wakro circle, is one of the seniormost volunteer-activists of the Lohit Youth Library Network, and is currently the president of the Forum of Library Activists, Medo.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\">Speaking from Bali to the youth library volunteers, Manisha said: &#8220;Coming from one of the most remote villages, being able to pitch at such a prestigious forum was a proud and unforgettable moment for me.&#8221; She said that she was extremely nervous but thrilled to pitch her story to an audience for the first time.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\">To her delight, everyone loved the film, applauded her presentation, and left impressed by her pitch, she said.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\">One of the first-batch students at KGBV Wakro, Halai&#8217;s love for books began with her involvement at APNE Library in Wakro and later at Bamboosa Library, Tezu.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\">&#8220;My participation in the two international AWIC Library conferences at Delhi helped me a lot to improve my storytelling skills,&#8221; she said.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\">She also remembered eminent docu-filmmaker PN Ramchandra from Mumbai, with whom she first saw a movie-camera, when he had visited Bamboosa and APNE Libraries. She and other young readers were featured in his film, Joy of Learning.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\">&#8220;That experience &#8211; seeing the camera, sound equipment, and behind-the-scenes process &#8211; left a lasting impression, even though I had no idea then that I would one day make films myself,&#8221; Halai stated.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\">She thanked all her mentors, teachers and library volunteers for their constant encouragement to pursue her interest in docu-filmmaking.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>ITANAGAR, 13 Sep: Manisha Halai from Arunachal Pradesh won the prestigious Australian International Documentary Conference Award and the Audience Award in Bali, Indonesia, for her debut feature documentary Orange Beetle: Mother &amp; I. She travelled abroad for the first time to participate in the &#8216;Docs by the Sea Storytelling Lab and Pitching Forum&#8217; held at [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":270684,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-270667","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-state-news"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/arunachaltimes.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/270667","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/arunachaltimes.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/arunachaltimes.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/arunachaltimes.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/arunachaltimes.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=270667"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/arunachaltimes.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/270667\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/arunachaltimes.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/270684"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/arunachaltimes.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=270667"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/arunachaltimes.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=270667"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/arunachaltimes.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=270667"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}