Miffed Kamal Haasan rejects festival tribute

There will be no golden jubilee tribute to actor Kamal Haasan at the International Film Festival of India at Goa. Haasan fans will instead, have to make do with a ‘Retrospective’ in Delhi later this year. Nandini R Iyer reports.

There will be no golden jubilee tribute to actor Kamal Haasan at the International Film Festival of India (IFFI) at Goa.

The IFFI, scheduled between November 23 and December 3, has a special segment ‘Golden Jubilee in Indian Cinema’ where thespians Sharmila Tagore, Asha Parekh and Soumitro Chatterjee will be honoured. Three films of each will be screened in ‘tribute’.

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Haasan fans will instead, have to make do with a ‘Retrospective’ in Delhi later this year.

Senior government officials, who did not wish to be named, said Haasan, found the government’s format of screening three films “insufficient to encapsulate his work”. “He wanted at least seven films to be screened but we could not accommodate that,” said an official.

Haasan and his media contact person did not reply telephone and e-mail queries to seek his version.

Government officials said: “His request for screening seven films was not unreasonable, he is among the greatest actors India has produced. Our problem was that there are three others being honoured…it would have taken the number of films from 12 to 28, were we to screen seven films of each. It would have thrown the entire schedule out of gear.”