Delhi can be a gateway to North India for filmmaking, say filmmakers

Parent Category: News and Stories

Posted in: Entertainment on Wednesday, 01 August 2012 00:00

Delhi Women and Child Development and Languages Minister, Dr. Kiran Walia said the Delhi government had already worked to make Delhi the cultural hub of the country and would be eager to help in turning the city into a film hub, if concrete suggestions were made by anyone.

Inaugurating a two-day meet on ‘Is India’s next film city?, as part of the 12th Osian’s Cinefan Festival for Asian and Arab Cinema, she said, “Delhi can become a film production centre as a gateway to north and north-east India”. She said, “Things could be worked out if any party came forward for this purpose, adding that Chief Minister Sheila Dikshit had asked her to convey this sentiment.Meanwhile, the Government is close to drawing up a plan for single-window clearance system for those wanting to shoot in the country.

Eminent filmmaker Bobby Bedi said the Information and Broadcasting Ministry had been working on this for several months and was very close to finalising the details of the policy.

Similarly, Delhi Tourism is also close to working out a policy, whereby it will facilitate film shooting in the National Capital Territory Region. Delhi Tourism and Transport Development Corporation, managing director G G Saxena said a booklet would be issued soon about the facilities that can be offered to filmmakers.

Earlier, Osian’s Chairman Neville Tuli announced that his group was setting up a museum, which will house material relating to the arts, Osianama, in Delhi as its contribution towards helping Delhi grow as a major hub of cultural activities. He said cinema can play a complimentary role in this endeavour.

He said, it was unfortunate that filmmakers never left the infrastructures they built for their films for others to use; otherwise Delhi would have had enough infrastructure by now.He was categorical that it was wrong to depend on the government for everything as it had no role in a private endeavour. Even monuments, where filmmakers decide to shoot their films should be given on payment. Delhi can embrace cinema in a more systematic way, and there has to be a collaboration between the government and the private sector.

Bobby Bedi said it was unfortunate that cinema’s role had never been seen as culture. He said this country is held together by cricket and cinema, apart from language,  English or Hindi. Thus cinema plays a major national role.
There is therefore a strong case for establishing cinema in North India as a gateway to the North and the North-east. He said it was a cakewalk to shoot films in Delhi as compared to Mumbai, and so it was for the Information and Broadcasting Ministry to approve this. And there were ample places available in the NCR outside the main city, for developing a film city.

However, eminent filmmaker, Shekhar Kapur did not feel that Delhi could be a film hub because all the decision makers were in Mumbai and all the talent moved out of Delhi to Mumbai. He said that there was need to open more institutions to train people in filmmaking, if Delhi was to become a hub, adding that he regretted that the talent from the National School of Drama did not stay in the capital. He also said that most of the decision makers, the producers, were in Mumbai. Creative people needed creative environments and could not flourish in a bureaucratic city.

Sudhir Tandon of Osian’s who is coordinating the two-day meet said the aim of Osian’s was to start a debate on the subject. 

For further details, please contact:
Supriya Chawla, Osian’s-Cinefan    T: 9810342972    F: 011-4174 3177   E: This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.

Shirin Amrute, Prana PR (Mumbai) T: 09769229595   F: 022-2288 4058   E: This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.

Ankit Nagpal, Bang on Target (N.Delhi) T: 09810542096                          E: This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.

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Website: Cinefan.osians.com