Prakash Belawadi

Prakash Belawadi (born 3 March 1961) is an Indian theatre artist, film director, television and media personality, who's also a teacher, activist and a journalist. He hails from Bengaluru.^[1] He has participated in many seminars, conferences and festivals in India and abroad. He is a motivational speaker at events and TEDx conferences.^[2][3][4][5] He is also a mentor with the founding team of BISFF (Bengaluru International Short Film Festival) since 2010.^[6]

Prakash Belawadi
Belawadi during the making of theatrical play of Parva in 2021
Born	(1961-03-03) 3 March 1961 (age 63) Bangalore, Karnataka, India
Alma mater	UVCE, Bengaluru
Occupations	Actor filmmaker television personality motivational speaker
Years active	1972–present
Organisation	Loksatta
Notable work	Madras Cafe Airlift The Tashkent Files The Kashmir Files
Spouse	Chandrika Belawadi
Children	2
Mother	Bhargavi Narayan
Relatives	Sudha Belawadi (sister) Samyukta Hornad (niece)

Early life

Belawadi was born into a family of theatre artists in Bangaluru, in the erstwhile Mysuru State (now Karnataka).^[7] His father, Belawadi Nanjundaiah Narayan (1929–2003) popularly known as Makeup Nani, was a personality in Kannada theatre, who also appeared in films, and worked as a make-up artist. His mother, Bhargavi Narayan, was a renowned film and theatre artiste. His siblings Sujata, Sudha and Pradeep, and nieces and nephews are also variously connected with theatre, music, television and cinema.^[8] He completed his elementary education at Mahila Seva Samaja, higher school education in National High School, following which he completed his pre-university course at National College, Bangaluru.^[9] He obtained a degree in mechanical engineering from University Visvesvaraya College of Engineering in 1983,^[10]

Awards

• Prakash Belawadi's debut film Stumble, which he wrote and directed, won the National Award for Best Film in the English language, 2003.^[11]
• He was conferred ‘Pratibha Bhushan’ in 2003 by the Government of Karnataka for his contribution to culture.^[12]
• He was recipient of Karnataka Nataka Academy Award (2011–12) for his contribution to English and Kannada-language theatre,^[13] and
• He was awarded the ‘Pride of Karnataka’ by Bangalore Round Table (2015),.^[14]
• He was the ‘Varshada Kannadiga’ (2015) in the field of entertainment, conferred by News 18 Kannada.^[15]
• He was given Helpmann Award, Australia (2019) for Best Actor, Male in the play 'Counting and Cracking', Belvoir St. Theatre, Sydney".^[16][17]

International

Belawadi as mentioned earlier has participated in many seminars, conferences and festivals in India^{[18][19][20][21][22]} and abroad, including the Beyond Bollywood conference at the Gothenburg International Film Festival, 2010 ^[23] the Performing Arts Market conference in Seoul, 2011 ^[24] the 50th Theatertreffen – annual theatre festival meet at Berlin, 2013 ^[25] and the seminar and exhibition, ‘Nature – A Good Idea’ at Trollhättan, Sweden in 2014.^[26] He has been faculty for film courses in Sweden and Istanbul, Turkey.^[27]

Partial filmography

S. L. Bhyrappa (left) and Prakash Belavadi (middle) discussing about the making of theatrical play on novel Parva

Prakash Belavadi, addressing an audience

Films

Year	Film	Role	Language	Notes
1973	Abachurina Postofficu		Kannada	Child actor
1978	Muyyi		Kannada	Child actor
1999	Kanooru Heggadithi		Kannada
2001	Mathadana		Kannada
2013	Madras Cafe	Bala	Hindi
2014	Youngistaan	Murli Mukundan	Hindi
2015	Benkipatna	Limba Rama	Kannada
	Uttama Villain	Dr D. S. (Neurosurgeon)	Tamil
	Aatagara	Dr. Chetan Bhagawat	Kannada
	Fading Red	ACP Ravikumar	Kannada	Short film
	Kendasampige	DCP Suryakanth	Kannada
	Talvar	Ramshankar Pillai	Hindi
2016	Wazir	DCP	Hindi
	Last Bus	Sandy	Kannada
	Airlift	George Kutty	Hindi
	Kiragoorina Gayyaligalu	A Government Officer	Kannada
	Ishtakamya	Vikranth	Kannada
	Te3n	Kumar	Hindi
2017	Take Off	Rajan Menon	Malayalam
	Aake	PK	Kannada
	Meri Pyaari Bindu	Bindu's father	Hindi
	Solo	Vishnu	Malayalam	Bilingual film
			Tamil
	Dayavittu Gamanisi		Kannada
	Aval	Joshua	Tamil[28]	Bilingual film
	The House Next Door		Hindi
	Mufti	Social worker	Kannada
2018	Sanju	Kamal Kishore "KK" Arora	Hindi
2019	The Accidental Prime Minister	M. K. Narayanan	Hindi
	Thackeray	George Fernandes	Hindi
	Natasaarvabhowma	Shruthi's uncle	Kannada
	The Tashkent Files	GK Ananthasuresh	Hindi
	Saaho	Shinde	Telugu	Bilingual film
			Hindi
	Katha Sangama	Sathya Murthy	Kannada
2020	Shakuntala Devi	Bishaw Mitra Mani	Hindi
	Soorarai Pottru	Prakash Babu	Tamil
	Yuvarathnaa	Shatrughan Salimath	Kannada
2021	100	Sadanand	Kannada
2022	One Cut Two Cut	Pruthiraj	Kannada
	The Kashmir Files	Dr. Mahesh Kumar	Hindi
	India Lockdown	M. Nageshwar Rao	Hindi
	Hope	Vijayasimha	Kannada
	Head Bush		Kannada
2023	Pathaan	Dr. Sahani	Hindi
	Mysore Masala: The UFO Incident	Dr. Satyaprakash	Kannada	[29]
	Pentagon		Kannada	Anthology film; segment Kamaturam Na Bhayam Na Lajja
	Savitri	Dr. Jayaprakash	Kannada	[30]
2024	O2	Dr. Mrutyunjay	Kannada
	The Judgement†		Kannada	[31]
	Sarfira		Hindi	[32]
	My Hero		Kannada	[33]

Television

Year	Name	Role	Language	Network	Notes
2018	Smoke	Bhau	Hindi	Eros Now
2020	High	Dr. Shridhar Roy	Hindi	MX Player
2021	Mumbai Diaries 26/11	Dr. Mani Subramaniam	Hindi	Amazon Prime Video	recurring role
2022	Humble Politician Nograj	Krishna Gundu Bala (KGB)	Kannada	Voot Select	Main cast

As director

• His debut film feature has now been included in the national telecaster Doordarshan's Best of Indian Cinema series.^[34]
• The serial ‘Garva’, which he wrote and directed in 2001 is still considered a classic among Kannada serials.^[35]

But Belawadi believes he belongs to the stage.^[36]

Activism

Belawadi is one of the founding members of Citizens for Bengaluru, an active platform for people to engage with the city government to make it accountable to citizens.^[37] Belawadi curates ‘Rotary Avani’, an annual ecology festival in Bengaluru between 22 April, International Mother Earth Day and 5 June, World Environment Day, to create awareness about the environment, in The Five Elements – Earth, Water, Fire, Air and Sky, so that people, together with government, industry, business and citizens can participate in initiatives to improve urban ecological health.^[38][39]

References

1. Patel, Aakar (31 August 2013). "A restless Renaissance Man".
2. "TEDx talks by Prakash Belwadi". Simply Life India Speakers Bureau.
3. "Interactive Movies, Prakash Belawadi, TEDxSIBMBengaluru". YouTube. 5 April 2017.
4. "When Tomorrow Comes, Prakash Belawadi, TEDxBITBangalore". YouTube. 10 January 2018.
5. "Identities," Are you really what you are ? ", Prakash Belawadi, TEDxNMIMSBangalore". YouTube. 26 March 2019.
6. "Prakash Belawadi, A mentor at BISFF'19". Bengaluru International Short Film Festival. Archived from the original on 19 December 2019. Retrieved 19 December 2019.
7. "BEST OF BANGALORE - Innovation Edition". 21 July 2014. Retrieved 21 July 2014.
8. "Family time in Kannada films". Deccan Herald. 8 November 2019.
9. "Prakash Belawadi - Ward No 142 - Loksatta Party (LSP) Candidate - BBMP Elections". My Bengaluru. 26 March 2010. Archived from the original on 19 December 2019. Retrieved 19 December 2019.
10. "Alumni of UVCE".
11. "The 50th National Film Awards". outlookindia.com. 30 July 2003.
12. "Pratibha Bhushan title is conferred on Nikhil Joshi and Prakash Belawadi (culture)". The Times of India. 19 August 2003. Retrieved 19 August 2003.
13. "Venkatswamy, Belawadi get Nataka Academy Awards". newindianexpress.com. 28 September 2012. Retrieved 28 September 2012.
14. "Pride of Karnataka Awards 2015". Round Table India blogs.^{[permanent dead link‍]}
15. "Kannadiga of the year 2018". Kannadiga of the year 2018. Archived from the original on 26 June 2022. Retrieved 21 December 2019.
16. "Best Male Actor in a Play, Helpmann Awards 2019".
17. "Helpmann awards 2019: Belvoir sweeps stage industry accolades over two nights". TheGuardian.com. 15 July 2019.
18. "Archives for Prakash Belawadi". Bangalore Literature Festival.
19. Duttagupta, Ishani. "Sweden-India Nobel Memorial Week: Does Rabindranath Tagore still matter". The Economic Times. Retrieved 17 November 2013.
20. "A Lecture Series on the Practitioner's Approach Lecture 7, Production of Knowledge in the Arts, FIXING CLIVE in HISTORY". The Centre for Contemporary Studies, Indian Institute of Science.
21. "Prakash Belwadi at the Mangaluru Literary Festival 2018". The Hindu. 31 October 2018. Retrieved 31 October 2018.
22. "Prakash Belwadi at the Mangaluru Literary Festival 2019". The Deccan Herald. Retrieved 23 November 2019.
23. "Beyond Bollywood". GU Journal no 5-2010. 11 November 2010. Retrieved 11 November 2010.
24. "Venue in Need for More In-depth Interactive Discussions" (PDF).
25. HORWITZ, ANDY (23 August 2013). "Notes From Berlin". culturebot.org. Retrieved 23 August 2013.
26. "NATURE: A GOOD IDEA".
27. "Film Lab - to Explore the Image of The Other (FBF630)". akademinvaland.gu.se. Archived from the original on 15 December 2019. Retrieved 15 December 2019.
28. "Mani Ratnam isn't a fan of horror films: Milind Rau". 5 October 2017.
29. Suresh, Sunayana. "A multi-starrer sci-fi adventure drama in the works in Kannada - Times of India". The Times of India. Retrieved 6 April 2019.
30. "Savitri movie review: Vijay Raghavendra's psychological thriller is bland".
31. Moviekoop. "The Judgement Movie | Cast, Release Date, Trailer, Posters, Reviews, News, Photos and Videos". Moviekoop. Retrieved 28 January 2024.
32. "Sarfira Movie (2024): Cast, Trailer, OTT, Songs, Release Date | सरफिरा | Exclusive 2024 - Gheun Taak". Gheun Taak. 6 July 2024. Retrieved 6 July 2024.
33. Sharadhaa, A. (12 August 2024). "My Hero Movie Review: A tribute to the human spirit beyond traditional Kannada Cinema". Cinema Express.
34. "THE BEST of INDIAN CINEMA on DD NATIONAL 'Stumble'". facebook.com.
35. "16 Old Kannada TV Serials Which Have Made Our Childhood Awesome and Fun-filled". metrosaga.com. 23 September 2018. Archived from the original on 30 July 2019. Retrieved 23 September 2018.
36. ""I Can Quit Acting, Not Theatre" Says Actor-Director Prakash Belawadi". starofmysore.com. 2 August 2017.
37. "How Bengaluru got its pride back: The steel flyover protests gave it a robust citizen's movement". scroll.in. 19 March 2017. Retrieved 19 March 2017.
38. "Celebrating Environment by Rotary Avani".
39. I'm involved in issues that hurt us the most: Prakash Belawadi-Yourstory

External links

• Prakash Belawadi at IMDb