Directorate of Film Festival mulling on reintroducing students-section for IFFI 2017

Since 2010, IFFI held screening of students films from atleast four premier film institutes – FTII, Satyajit Ray Film and Television Institute in Kolkata, AJ Kidwai Mass Communication Research Centre and MGR Governing Film and Television Institute in Chennai.

However, following 2015 protest by Film & Television Institute of India (FTII) against the appointment of Gajendra Singh Chauhan as the FTII chairman, DFF strategically withdrew the ‘student section’ at the film festival to avoid unforseen events.

Although this year atleast seven entries have been sent from FTII to IFFI, none of the movies have been shortlisted for this years screening, although FTII faculty have been conducting workshops on subjects like acting, screenwriting, and film appreciation and also hosting institute kiosks (stalls).

However steering away controversy, DFF director Senthil said that ‘students-section’ for the second consecutive year was withdrawn as they had to accommodate other categories of films. “We had overwhelming number of domestic and foreign entries to the fest – which we had to accommodate. Student section has separate parameters, we will are reconsidering the screening of their movies – next year onwards,” he said.