President Iajuddin Ahmed opened the festival at Osmani Memorial Hall, also attended by Selima Rahman, state minister for cultural affairs, Momtaj Jasimuddin, wife of poet Jasimuddin, and Sandeep Ray, film director and son of Satyajit Ray, as special guests.

The president distributed Tonatuni awards among 17 senior artistes and juveniles at the function followed by a cultural show. Mojibur Rahman Dilu, coordinator of the festival, conducted the programme.

Iajuddin said former president Ziaur Rahman loved children and launched the Nutan Kuri programme on Bangladesh Television, opening a new horizon for children to flourish their latent talent.

He thanked Tonatuni for giving awards to some of the champions of Nutan Kuri.

The president also thanked the organisation for giving posthumous awards to poet Jasimuddin and filmmaker Satyajit Ray for their outstanding contribution to literature and films.

Iajuddin called upon all to take initiatives to educate 250 million child labourers around the world.

The state minister asked everyone to make it a tradition to work with children and award eminent personalities in different fields.

Sandeep thanked Tonatuni for bringing together the beautiful works of two neighbouring countries and read out a letter from his mother, Bijoya Ray, in which she said she could not attend the function because of her illness.

Mojibur Rahman Dilu said, "We don't want to draw borders between cultures."

Tonatuni staged its nursery rhyme Toray Badha Ghorar Dim based on the works of Satyajit. The programme came to an end with the recitation of poems by film celebrity Soumitra Chatterjee.

The Tonatuni Awards 2003 were handed over to Momtaj Jasimuddin, Soumitra Chatterjee, Sandeep Ray, Mamota Shankar, Babita, Haradhan Banerjee, Shova Sen, Madhuri Mukherjee, Tapan Chatterjee, Baishakhi Ghosh, Kaderi Kibria, Ishita, Orin Haque, Shanta, Maria Promi and Tushar.

The Tonatuni Festival will be running at the National Museum until September 16.