(Image source from: IMDb)

Period. End of Sentence, a film revolving around women in India fighting against the deeply-rooted stigma of the menstrual cycle and delving upon the work of real-life Pad Man Arunachalam Muruganatham, has made it to the Oscar shortlist in the Documentary Short Subject category.

The film is executive produced by Guneet Monga and is co-produced by Monga's Sikhya Entertainment, which has backed films like The Lunchbox and Masaan.

Soon after the Oscar shortlist was announced on Monday, Monga posted on Instagram: "Waking up to this shortlist! So proud and so exciting... I am so humbled to be a part of the producing team."

 

 

 

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Waking up to this shortlist!! So proud and soo exciting. Watch out for “Period. End of Sentence” our short documentary directed by @raykaz shot by @samdavisdp produced by school girls of Oakwood , Melissa Burton , @lisataback , Garrett. I am so humbled to be a part of the producing team. Executive Produced by me and a @sikhya co-production thank you @stacey_sher for bringing me on board

A post shared by Guneet Monga (@guneetmonga) on Dec 17, 2018 at 5:47pm PST

Directed by award-winning Iranian-American filmmaker Rayka Zehtabchi, the film is created by The Pad Project, an organization established by students at the Oakwood School in Los Angeles and their teacher Melissa Berton.

The 26-minute film follows girls and women in northern India's Hapur and their experience with the installation of a pad machine in their village.

According to hollywoodreporter.com, the film also delves upon Muruganantham's invention of the easy-to-operate machine that makes low-cost sanitary napkins using supplies that are readily available in India.

Muruganantham, whose story inspired the Bollywood feature film Pad Man, brings his machines to these small towns, helping train women to operate them and in turn sell the supplies at very low-cost prices to other women in their area. The women retain the profits of their labor, effectively creating a sustainable women-run micro-business that protects both their health and their community's economic future.

Period. End of Sentence is among 10 films that have advanced in the Documentary Short Subject category for the 91st Academy Awards. A total of 104 films had originally qualified in the category.

India's entry for the Foreign Language Film Category, Village Rockstars is out of the Oscar race, as is Iram Haq's Norwegian drama What Will People Say, starring Indian actors Adil Hussain and Ekavali Khanna.

The nominations for 91st Oscars will be announced on January 22, 2019, a month ahead of the Oscars ceremony, which is scheduled to be held on February 24, 2019.

-Sowmya