Team Herald
PANJIM: Entertainment Society of Goa (ESG) on Sunday announced a special section for Goan films during the ongoing 52nd International Film Festival of India (IFFI).
ESG vice chairman Subhash Phaldesai told media persons that eight Goan films will be screened in the special section. Of these only one is a feature film and seven are non-feature films.
The premiere section will showcase ”Gagan”, a non-feature film produced by Suraj Kerkar and directed by Brijesh Kakodkar; ”Limits”, a non-feature Marathi film produced and directed by Vardhan Kamat; ”Kupamcho Daryo”, a non-feature film produced by Kishor Arjun Shinde and directed by Himanshu Singh and a feature film ”D’Costa House” produced by Dr Pramodini Salgaocar and directed by Jitendra Shikerkar.
In the non-premiere section, another Konkani film “Paul 10”, produced by Rupa Ramesh Rivankar and directed by Sunil Rivankar will be screened.
The Goan films were selected by a three-member jury consisting of filmmaker and actor S V Rajendra Singh Babu as chairman and cinematographer Prashantyanu Mahapatra and filmmaker and actor Pramod Pawar as members.
The ESG announcement came a few hours after Goa Pradesh Congress Committee (GPCC) president Girish Chodankar threatened to hold protests if the selected films in the premiere and non-premiere sections are not announced.
Meanwhile, Leader of Opposition Digambar Kamat demanded that the ESG must announce whether all the selected films will be part of official section of 52nd IFFI and whether the film producers will get benefits under the Goa Film Finance Scheme.
Kamat demanded that the ESG must cancel Clause 9 of the Regulations issued by them, for selecting Goan films for IFFI-2021 and grant financial assistance of Rs five lakh to feature films, and Rs 2.5 lakh to non-feature films selected for the festival.
Screening films without giving any benefits to the local film fraternity is nothing but cheating. BJP government needs to be sensitive towards local film fraternity, who have produced films braving COVID-19 pandemic, Kamat said and congratulated the teams of all five films selected for IFFI-2021.
