Nepal-Africa Film Festival: Nepal’s ‘Prakash’ and Mozambique’s ‘Train of Salt and Sugar’ Best

Kathmandu. The Nepal-Africa Film Festival 2023 has been completed. Dinesh Raut’s ‘Prakash’ became the best film in the competition for Nepali films, while ‘The Train of Salt and Sugar’ directed by Licinio Azevedo from Mozambique, was declared the best film in the competition for African films.
Shambhujit Baskota, the former vice-chancellor of the Nepal Music and Drama Institute, presented the award to the winning film. Isi Hamoh won the Jury Award for her short film ‘Ya’ in the African competition. In the best African documentary category, Zimbabwe’s ‘Calling the Dead’ became the best.
For the Nepali competition, Vikas Subedi won the best screenplay writer award for the film Prakash, and Elish Karki won the best music composer award for the background song Manchhe Mangbo of the same film.

Tej Giri won the best actor award for ‘Premgunj’. Neeta Dhungana won the award for the actress's movie ‘Bhagya’. From ‘Bhagya’, Roshan Kumar Shrestha won the best director award, actor Yash Raj Garach won the jury award, and Sunil Katuwal won the supporting actor award.
Basundhara Bhusal from the movie ‘Parivar’ for co-actress, Krishna Bahadur Thapa for cinematography from Hukka, Birendra Bhat for editing from film change, ‘Duvidha’ directed by Pradyumna Mishra for the short film category, ‘Samarpan’ directed by Roshni KC for the documentary category, and Samal Kumar Bajracharya of Nepal Film Campus won ‘Havaman’ for the best student film category. Received from
The festival was organized by the College of Journalism and Mass Communication and co-organized by the Film Development Board and Rakshana Creation. In this edition, a total of 22 films, 12 from 11 African countries, were screened. On the second day of the festival, there was also an interaction among filmmakers about the international market for short films.
During the ceremony, Baskota, the former vice-chancellor of the Nepal Music and Drama Academy and musician, said that the government should give special support to such an international festival. Film Society President Krishna Malla said that the Nepal-Africa Film Festival is a different kind of international film festival.
Manju Mishra, principal and festival director of the organizing institution, the College of Journalism, said that even though Africa is ignoring them, Nepal has been holding the festival. Producers Association President Naval Khadka, Directors Association President Janakdeep Parajuli, Artists Association Secretary General Savin Shrestha, Koshi Pradesh MP Meena Shrestha, and others said that this festival has given film lovers living in Nepal a taste of African films.