A 101-member organising committee has been set up for the smooth conduct of this year’s international film festival of Kerala (IFFK), with Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan as the chief patron and the Culture Minister A.K. Balan as festival president.
Various sub-committees on hospitality, programme, finance, media, delegate cell, technical, sponsorship, volunteer, audience poll and theatre committee have also been set up.
Inaugurating the meeting to form the organising committee, Mr. Balan, said that even when the State was still trying to recover from the devastating floods, the government had decided to organise the IFFK on a limited budget to ensure that the cultural scene was kept alive.
In the background of the floods, for this year alone, the delegate fee is being hiked to ₹2,000 and everyone, including Ministers will attend IFFK only after paying this delegate fee.
Students’ fee will be ₹1000. There will be no free passes.
There will be donation boxes at all festival venues to be given to the CM’s distress relief fund.
All cinema industry -related organisations and individuals should cooperate for the smooth conduct of IFFK, in matters such as theatre rates, Mr. Balan, appealed.
There will be no reduction in the number of films. Owing to budgetary constraints, foreign delegates, some awards and foreign jury are being avoided.
IFFK is being held on a budget of ₹3.5 crore and this year. In Malayalam Retrospective, films by Lenin Rajendran will be screened.
The duration of the IFFK this year will be for seven days, instead of the customary eight days.
