Goa, Rajasthan, Karnataka market themselves as shooting locales

Panaji, Nov 25 (UNI) The film bazaar, organised by the Confederation of Indian Industry (CII) at the 37th International Film Festival of India (IFFI), has for the first time set up pavillion for Indian states to promote themselves as film shooting destinations.

Only four states- Goa, Rajasthan, Karnataka and Himachal Pradesh responded to the CII invitation. Madhya Pradesh had booked a table space, but backed out at the last minute due to logistic problems, said a CII spokesman.

According to him, the CII had invited about eight to ten film producing states which also have good shooting locales to attend the Location Pavillion at the film bazaar.

''Maharashtra and Tamil Nadu did not show interest.This being the first year of such an endeavour, the CII hopes that there would be more responses in the coming years,'' he added.

Maharashtra had recently announced a tourism policy where Bollywood tourism was one of the main highlightd. Bollywood tourism comprises setting up a film museum, guided tours to film studios and locations among others.

When states like Karnataka and Rajasthan promoted themselves in terms of exotic locales and giving list of Bollywood and Hollywood movies filmed there , Maharashtra was conspicous by its absence, Mumbai based filmmaker Ashok Pandit commented.

''Many films like Chingari, Mangal Pandey, Swades have been shot in interior Maharashtra in recent years. But, our state government has chosen to ignore this important platform,'' he lamented.

Speaking on the occasion, Mr I M Vithalmurthy , Secretary of Kannada-Culture Information and Tourism in the Karnataka government said his state had thematic settings for shooting movies with heritage and wildlife in abundance.

He said his government was willing to extend all co-operation to enterpreneurs who wish to develop Ramnagara, a location about 40 km away from Bangalore where ''Sholay' was shot into a tourist destination. He said applications for film shootings are processed in two to three weeks of submission after thorough scrutiny by the state Information department.

Entertainment Society of Goa (ESG) General Manager Nikhil Desai said the Goa government has notified the ESG as the single window clearance agency for obtaining film shooting permissions in two days. Since the notification last week, the ESG has given clearance to four producers. ''This is a small step in the right direction,''he said and added that Entertainment industry was heading towards a massive boom and Goa wanted to have a share in the pie. Efforts are on to develop the state into a animation hub which would give boost to information technology and software industries in the state.

Goa Chief Secretary J P Singh informed that Crest Animation, one of the largest Hollywood animation studio, is in the process of accquiring 25 acre of land for setting up animation production facility which would give a boost to employment opportunities in the state.

He said IT/Software parks are being encouraged in form of SEZ.

O P Isharwal , Manager of Rajasthan tourism development corporation (RTDC) said the state government has allocated 100 acre of land for a film city near Jaipur. Both Karnataka and Rajasthan said they did not have a single window clearance system. Mr Vithalmurthy said Single window was a tricky affair. 'A single window often opens several other windows.'' While Mr Isharwal said a single window clearance agency was under active consideration of his government.

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