CHANDIGARH,20.04.24-The Punjabi Department of Mehr Chand Mahajan DAV College for Women, Chandigarh organised an interactive session titled ‘From Story to Screen: A Journey from Moh Pash to Sade Aale’. The session envisioned to enlighten the students about the nuances of the adaptation of a story into a film through the example of the adaptation of Moh Pash into Sade Aale. The enriching session was conducted with experts- Balwinder Singh Grewal, Punjabi Story Writer and writer of Moh Pash, Dr. Daljit Ami, Director, EMRC, Punjabi University, Patiala and Jatinder Mauhar, Story Writer, Script Writer and Director.
Beginning the discussion with an insight into his creative process of conception of a story from a thought, Balwinder Singh Grewal went on to lament the prevalence of fleeting emotions in the present age of social media which has robbed people of the sensitivity to devour the sensibilities of literature. He further added that the battle that the story has lost is being fought by cinema. Pointing out to the difference of the medium, Balwinder said that a story speaks only through words while a film’s landscape is much more vivid in terms of the various techniques available for putting across a point. On adapting the story for the screen, Daljit Ami said that the film can relate to and retain the core of the story when the film maker fully understands the thought behind the story or the question it raises. He added that the ecology of the story writer and that of the film makers are different, and thus, they visualise and shape the characters differently. Adding that a story exists in allegory and there are different layers in a film’s narrative, Daljit asserted that material changes are bound to be made in the story when it is made into a film. Daljit also discussed the subversive potential of fiction and shed light on how the rendering of characters’ interiority can help in using them as agents to highlight positive things like peace, solidarity, etc. Jatinder Mauhar brought out the difference between the medium of story writing and that of film making, and highlighted that the impactful visuals in the film do not need words. Taking the example of his film Sade Aale, Jatinder said that it was a challenge to decide the end of the film i.e. whether to keep the original story’s end or to make it aligned with the commercial compulsions. The session ended with the experts answering the inquisitive queries of the participants.

Principal Dr. Nisha Bhargava congratulated the Punjabi Department for providing students an opportunity to explore the realms of story writing and film making through the lens of a story writer and a film maker. She added that such initiatives are imperative for widening the horizons of the students