''Punyakoti'' (), also released as ''A Truthful Mother'', is a 2020 Indian

Sanskrit Sanskrit (; attributively , ; nominally , , ) is a classical language belonging to the Indo-Aryan branch of the Indo-European languages. It arose in South Asia after its predecessor languages had diffused there from the northwest in the late ...

-language animated film directed by Ravishankar Venkateswaran. It is the first animated film in Sanskrit. ''Punyakoti'' is an adaptation of a picture book for children written by Ravishankar, was produced through crowdsourcing and it is the first Sanskrit animated film. The film got certificate from

Central Board of Film Certification The Central Board of Film Certification (CBFC) is a statutory film-certification body in the Ministry of Information and Broadcasting of the Government of India. It is tasked with "regulating the public exhibition of films under the provision ...

on 18 March 2020, but its theatrical release was halted due to Corona pandemic. Finally

Samskrita Bharati Samskrita Bharati ( sa, संस्कृतभारती, Saṁskr̥tabhāratī, translit-std=ISO, ) is a non-profit organisation working to revive Sanskrit. Sanskrit was a pan-Indian language in the Vedic and classical period but lost its ...

premiered the film through online streaming platform

Vimeo Vimeo, Inc. () is an American video hosting, sharing, and services platform provider headquartered in New York City. Vimeo focuses on the delivery of high-definition video across a range of devices. Vimeo's business model is through software a ...

on 25 March 2020 and

Netflix Netflix, Inc. is an American subscription video on-demand over-the-top streaming service and production company based in Los Gatos, California. Founded in 1997 by Reed Hastings and Marc Randolph in Scotts Valley, California, it offers a fi ...

added the film to its platform on 31 March 2020.

Summary

''Punyakoti'' is based on a famous folksong in Karnataka written by in the

Kannada language Kannada (; ಕನ್ನಡ, ), originally romanised Canarese, is a Dravidian language spoken predominantly by the people of Karnataka in southwestern India, with minorities in all neighbouring states. It has around 47 million native ...

about a

cow Cattle (''Bos taurus'') are large, domesticated, cloven-hooved, herbivores. They are a prominent modern member of the subfamily Bovinae and the most widespread species of the genus ''Bos''. Adult females are referred to as cows and adult ma ...

that speaks the truth at all times. The story depicts man-animal conflict in a form that is both entertaining and informative. The movie carries the message of honesty and living in harmony with nature. The story is set in Karunadu, a village along the banks of

Kaveri The Kaveri (also known as Cauvery, the anglicized name) is one of the major Indian rivers flowing through the states of Karnataka and Tamil Nadu. The Kaveri river rises at Talakaveri in the Brahmagiri (hill), Karnataka, Brahmagiri range in th ...

during the

Vedic period The Vedic period, or the Vedic age (), is the period in the late Bronze Age and early Iron Age of the history of India when the Vedic literature, including the Vedas (ca. 1300–900 BCE), was composed in the northern Indian subcontinent, betwe ...

. The original source of the folk-song is the eighteenth chapter of ''Srishtikhand'' of

Padma Purana The ''Padma Purana'' ( sa, पद्मपुराण or पाद्मपुराण, or ) is one of the eighteen Major Puranas, a genre of texts in Hinduism. It is an encyclopedic text, named after the lotus in which creator god Bra ...

Cast

Revathi Asha Kelunni Nair (born 8 July 1966), better known by her stage name Revathi, is an Indian actress and director, known for her works predominantly in Tamil & Malayalam cinema - in addition to Telugu, Hindi & Kannada films. She has won several ...

as Punyakoti *

Roger Narayan Raj Narayan is an Indian actor who works in predominantly Kannada and English-language films. He is known for playing one of the leads in ''U Turn'' (2016). Career Roger Narayan studied engineering at BITS Pilani before deciding to pursue his p ...

as Kalinga *Sneha Ravishankar *SR Leela *Vidya Shankar

Release

''Punyakoti'' was first scheduled to release in 2016 but was later delayed to 2018. The film was shown at the 2019 Film Bazaar. The film was scheduled to release theatrically in April 2020 but was cast off due to the

coronavirus pandemic The COVID-19 pandemic, also known as the coronavirus pandemic, is an ongoing global pandemic of coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) caused by severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2). The novel virus was first identifie ...

and was released digitally on

in the same month.

References

External links

* * {{IMDb title, tt10834006 2020 films 2020 animated films Sanskrit-language films Indian animated films Indian children's films 2020s historical fantasy films Hindu mythological films Films scored by Ilaiyaraaja Films based on Indian folklore Indian direct-to-video films Films not released in theaters due to the COVID-19 pandemic Animated films about cattle Animated films about tigers Tigers in India

Summary

Cast

Release

See also

References

External links