Music Album of Marwari Film "Khoto Sikko" Released

GANGTOK, Oct 14 : Sikkim tourism is steadily achieving national acclaim and the 19 tourism-related awards that the State has received so far bears testimony to this, State Tourism Minister Bhim Dhungel said here today.

“We have so far received 19 tourism-related awards from various organizations and tomorrow Sikkim will receive another award taking up the total to 20 awards,” he added. He was speaking at the release of the Marwari film Khoto Sikko developed by a local filmmaker. The music of the first-ever contemporary Marwari film was released today by Bhim Dhungel. The Minister informed that Sikkim will be receiving the award from the India Traveller group and the award will be presented tomorrow at New Delhi where Resident Commissioner Arvind Kumar will receive the award on behalf of the State government.

Highlighting the vast tourism potential of Sikkim, Dhungel said Sikkim is rich in culture tourism, adventure tourism, eco-tourism and heritage tourism which are in demand in the tourism market. “Our biodiversity, rich culture and peace-loving people will also boost our tourism potential,” he added.

Sikkim houses several scenic places and the State government is doing its best to promote these areas, Dhungel said, adding the State government was giving thrust to tourism in order to encourage the local youth towards promoting tourism-related services. The State government is according priority to create more man-made attractions, he added.

A special screening of the film Khoto Sikko was also done at the Press Club of Sikkim (PCS) premises here. According to the director-producer of the film Rakesh Somani, Khoto Sikko is the first ever Marwari feature film in the world and would be ready for release in the first week of November.

He explained that the Marwari language, being spoken in the native area of the community in Rajasthan, was different from the language being spoken by the people who had migrated to the other parts of the nation.

“With the influence of various cultures and languages, particularly Hindi, a new face of Marwari language had emerged, which was different in both vocabulary as well as the prosody when compared to the classical variants spoken in various parts of Rajasthan,” Somani said. The shooting of the film started on May 20 and will be released after Diwali. The film runs over two-and-half hours and has seven songs. The movie was shot in Sikkim and West Bengal. The star cast in the film are from Sikkim, West Bengal and Nepal.

“The storyline of the film is based on the popular Marwari proverb ‘Khoto Sikko,’ meaning a useless coin, a spoilt brat helps in adversity,” said Bajgai.

(UNI)