Ang Lee’s latest film “Life of Pi” has received two national tourism awards for promoting Puducherry and Munnar in Kerala as tourist destinations.
The award would be given to Lee and Yann Martel, the author of the book.
Tourism minister Chiranjeevi has stated that he would promote film tourism as a niche tourism product. For the same, tourism ministry has also asked state governments to constitute special cells to facilitate filming in their respective States.
Announcing the award, Chiranjeevi said, “This will go a long way in encouraging more film producers from abroad to shoot their films in India.”
In February this year the Ministry of Tourism signed a MoU with Ministry of Information & Broadcasting as a major initiative to promote the ‘Incredible India’ campaign and Cinemas of India as a sub brand of ‘Incredible India’ at various international film festivals and markets abroad.
One of the key objectives of the memorandum is to initiate dialogue with state governments for development of locations for film shootings for international and domestic film industry.
As per the MoU, the Ministry of Tourism would provide budgetary support for identified film festivals, markets and events. The joint participation of the two Ministries would cover the Cannes Film Festival and Market, IFFI Goa including the Film Festival and Film Bazaar and European Film Market at Berlin.