Deadlock continues over film fest venue

With just few days left for the grand opening of the International Film Festival of India (IFFI) here, the deadlock over the venue for the opening ceremony and logistics associated with it remained.

The opening ceremony was initially touted by the directorate of film festivals (DFF) as a musical extravaganza featuring music maestro A R Rahman and is to be held in a closed auditorium at the Kala academy, which is the main venue for the festival.

However, chief minister Manohar Parrikar differed with DFF officials on Monday and insisted that at least Rahman's performance should be shifted to an open ground where the public could watch the gala event.

Meanwhile, government sources said that DFF officials were reluctant to agree on the proposal, saying it would be logistically difficult.

"It would be difficult to hold the initial part of the ceremony in the auditorium, then shift to the open venue for Rahman's performance and then back in again for the opening film of the festival""Mira Nair's 'Vanity Fair', DFF sources said.

Several other solutions were still being worked out so as to suit both parties. One such solution was that both the opening ceremony and the music act should be held outdoors and the movie could then be screened indoors, they added.

Meanwhile, festival director Neelam Kapur yesterday said that there were various possibilities as far as opening ceremony was concerned and that the logistics were being worked out.

Chairman of the IFFI co-ordination committee, Sripad Naik had yesterday announced to the press that rahman's performance would be held outside to "enable more people to watch it".

Kapur, however, denied that any venue had been finalised, saying "i don't want to contradict anyone on the matter. When the final venue is decided, the chief minister will announce it."

Kala academy had been announced as the venue of the opening ceremony even in the official IFFI schedules.

Parrikar, who represents Panaji assembly constituency, too remained non-committal on the issue. "The venue has not yet been finalised. We will work out the logistics and then decide. Although we are trying to get Rahman's show out in the open", he said.

State government sources said a lot of Goans will be disappointed if they could not witness a star act like Rahman live and this will get the festival off to a bad start.

"The auditorium has only 950 capacity. Out of this only 100 passes will come the way of Goa government and that is just not enough. Since Rahman will be the main draw, Parrikar is pushing for his performance to be made public", they said.

An extra amount of Rs 25 lakh was likely to be spent on constructing a stage for the event, sources said adding, DFF officials were still sceptical about the possibility of changing the venue.