Chaos may take film fest out of Goa

Govt may drop the idea of making Goa the permanent venue of annual IFFI, report K Mohamed and A Parashar.

Goa will not be the permanent venue of the annual International Film Festival of India anymore if the Ministry of Information Broadcasting has its way.

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Following the accelerating chaos, internal conflicts and major gaffes at the festival currently on in Goa, it is felt that after a break of three years, the nation’s most prestigious movie carnival should return to Delhi every alternate year and be rotated in other cities like Mumbai, Kolkata, Chennai, Trivandrum, Hyderabad and Bangalore.

High tension has erupted within the festival’s inner circles because of a goof-up in the brochure for the event’s homage section brought out by the Entertainment Society of Goa. The brochure has printed the photograph of film-maker Girish Karavalli in place of the revered Kannada movie superstar, the late Dr Raj Kumar.

Although the brochure has been withdrawn from circulation and an apology has been issued by the society’s CEO, Nandini Paliwal, festival delegates from Karnataka are still smarting. Also, the new state minister of Information and Broadcasting, film actor Ambarish from Karnataka, is far from amused.

A source from the I & B ministry stated that there is little hope that the Goa administrative machinery can improve upon the film festival’s infrastructure. More auditoria to accommodate the rising number of festivalgoers – from 4200 last year to 6500 -- are likely to take more than two years to complete.

It is learnt that the directorate of film festivals, headed by joint secretary V.B. Pyarelal, has prepared a detailed report about the mismanagement of the current festival. In addition, the normally stoic Press Information Bureau has sent a protest letter to the directorate, stating that the various agencies appointed for the festival, were making their job difficult of disseminating information about the daily film shows and press meets.

The proposal to make Goa a permanent venue for the festival had been initiated by BJP’s Sushma Swaraj when she headed the I&B Ministry. Today, the former chief minister of Goa and leader of opposition, Manohar Parrikar in a press conference has stated that the current festival is a “flop show.” He has also alleged corruption in the construction of a Rs. 1.8 crore jetty close to the festival venue.

Meanwhile, the Goa Civic and Consumer Action network has demanded a review of the government’s decision to make Goa a permanent film festival venue since it has given both the island city and the event a “a bad name.”