After taking Bollywood to a global audience in a never-before fashion in the last more than a decade, the International Indian Film Academy (IIFA) is now expanding to take the south Indian film industry under its wings.
The inaugural edition of the IIFA Utsavam, a celebration of the Malayalam, Tamil, Telugu and Kannada film industries will be held as a three day-long extravaganza bringing together the biggest of stars from the south Indian film industry at the Gachibowli outdoor stadium at Hyderabad from December 4 to 6.
The announcement was made in a glittering ceremony held in a city hotel on Thursday.
An advisory panel of eminent personalities from all the four industries has been constituted for IIFA Utsavam. This includes A.R. Rahman, Kamal Haasan, Suresh Babu, K.S. Rama Rao, Boney Kapoor, Nagarjuna, Allu Aravind, Resul Pookutty, R.B. Choudhary, Ram Kumar, Mukesh, Sibi Malayil, B. Unnikrishnan, Ramesh Aravind and Radikaa Sharathkumar.
After watching the promo for IIFA Utsavam, filmmaker and IIFA advisory panel member B. Unnikrishnan struck a note of caution urging the organisers to ensure a fair representation for the Malayalam industry in the promotional campaign and in the actual event.
An opinion backed by actor Kavya Madhavan who recollected how the industry was sidelined during similar events in the past. Mr. Sibi Malayil and former Indian cricketer S. Sreesanth welcomed IIFA to the south.
The announcement of IIFA Utsavam coincided with the launch of voting by the film fraternity to adjudicate winners for the awards to be given away at the function in December.
Based on the voting on the entries for awards by a voting academy of 300 members drawn from all four industries, five nominations will be shortlisted for 12 popular awards, which would then be put up for a global opinion poll online. The winners will be announced at the function.
However, the ten technical awards instituted by IIFA Utsavam will be given away based on the votes of the voting academy alone. Apart from Kochi, the voting academy will cast the votes in three cities representing Tamil, Telugu and Kannada industries. Besides, six special awards have also been constituted.
Awards for Malayalam and Tamil industries will be given away on December 5 and that of Telugu and Kannada industries the day after.
