PANAJI: A day after the opening ceremony of the 54th International Film Festival of India, the head of a major festival jury slammed its organisers for turning it into a 'Bollywood tamasha' and 'nautanki'.
Arvind Sinha, who is chairperson of the Indian Panorama non-feature film jury, also said that the likes of Karan Johar shouldn't be given entry to the Iffi opening ceremony at all, let alone front row seats.
"They are Bollywood, they are different. What is their connection with cinema?" asked Sinha. "Everything is getting mixed up. The decision makers will have to take a decision. We cannot have a mix of this and that."
Sinha, an acclaimed documentary filmmaker, was speaking from the Iffi platform during a media interaction on the second day of the festival.
Doubling down on his criticism of the opening ceremony, he said, "Someone like Karan Johar does not need a platform to promote his films. They (the organisers) should not waste public money on getting him to sit in the front row."
Later, another acclaimed filmmaker, T S Nagabharana, who is the chairperson of the Indian Panorama feature film section jury, supported Sinha's views.
Gauree Malkarnekar, senior correspondent at The Times of India, G...
Read MoreGauree Malkarnekar, senior correspondent at The Times of India, Goa, maintains a hawk's eye on Goa's expansive education sector. And when she is not chasing schools, headmasters and teachers, she turns her focus to crime. Her entry into journalism was purely accidental: a trained commercial artist, she landed her first job as a graphic designer with a weekly, but less than a fortnight later set aside the brush and picked up the pen. Ever since she has not complained.
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