Narakal, Jan. 29, 2019: A documentary film, almost 3 years in the making, features the life and times of legendary Gandhian Sarvodayam Kurian of Vypin Island in Ernakulam district of Kerala. The film entitled Man Beyond Boundaries had its world premiere at Majestic Multiplex Theatre Narakal, January 28.
Member of Parliament from Vypin Mr. K.V. Thomas inaugurated the function which marked the birth centenary and 20th death anniversary of Kurian Parackal, popularly acclaimed as Sarvodayam Kurian.
Late Kurian Parackal of Narakkal (11 January, 1920 to 15 July, 1999) was never a card holding member of the Sarvodaya movement which works to promote the kind of society that Gandhiji envisioned.
On his return from Trincomalee (Sri Lanka) assignment with British Medical Corps after World War II, Kurian took up social work and for some 50 years of his life, he was known both in Kerala and abroad as the one and only Sarvodayam Kurian.
The documentary poster designed by Praveen Devassy has a tag line which reads “Father of 500 children, an island Samaritan, man who stood with the poor, the one and only Sarvodayam Kurian.”
Producer of the film, Sarvodayam’s eldest son Mr Cherian Kurian Parackal recalls, “certain Mr Ajay inspired by Sarvodayam Kurian’s activities in helping the needy and downtrodden started research and even managed to shoot certain scenes, both out door and in door, with Mr Jose Pettah in the role of Sarvodayam Kurian. However, Ajay could not complete the film and dropped at some point. That was in 2016.”
Fortunately Mr Cherian, since 2013 began to collect the scattered photographs and the newspaper clips on Sarvodayam as well as acquire some of the raw footage of news videos done by different people which was never screened.
“Knowing that, one day this would help,” reveals Cherian.
Two years later, in 2018, Mr Cherian says, Mr Arun N. Sivan from Calicut showed interest in the project and agreed to direct the film. Sivan soon engaged Mr. Krishna Kumar, a school teacher from Calicut to prepare the script and got Manu an associate editor for several movies to edit the film.
President Sarvodayam Kurian Smaraka Trust Mr. Paul J. Mampilly released the film which Managing Director of Majestic Multiplex Mr. Pauly Valooran hosted, while former Goa Port Chairman Mr Jose Paul Sankoorikal was the chief guest and keynote speaker.
“Since we had to limit the documentary to just 55 minutes, we could not accommodate the whole lot of video clips available,” says Producer of the documentary Sarvodayam’s eldest son Mr Cherian Kurian.