Mathrubhumi Daily and Amrita TV, two major players in the print and electronic media in Kerala, team up to present the Idea-Mathrubhumi-Amrita Film Awards 2009 to be held on February 21 at the Chandrasekharan Nair Stadium, Thiruvananthapuram. Nominations have already been made from the 61 films produced in 2008.

Amrita TV, one of the leading Malayalam TV channels and the only satellite channel in India to have earned 29 State Awards for excellence in TV, said that a four-hour star-studded entertainment programme with performances by artistes and troupes from Bollywood, Kollywood and Mollywood will be organized as part of the awards night. Over 30,000 people are expected to attend the show.

The awards are decided by public voting, jury opinion and nominations. Some of the key award categories in AFA 2009 are: best film, direction, acting (male/ female), script, music, lyrics, song (male/ female), cinematography, editing, costume, art and make-up. Besides these conventional categories, Amrita TV has also included some innovative categories that will be announced by the jury.

The previous winners of the 2008 awards include Mammootty (actor), Meera Jasmine (actress), Arabikkatha (film), Shyamaprasad (director), Ouseppachan (music director) and Sreenivasan (screenplay).