West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee, on Friday, virtually inaugurated the 26th Kolkata International Film Festival (KIFF), reported PTI. Banerjee further allowed full occupancy of cinema halls in the state with adherence to COVID-19 safety protocols. The ceremony was virtually attended by Bollywood superstar Shah Rukh Khan. 

131 movies from 45 countries will be screened till January 13, with legendary filmmaker Satyajit Ray’s classic ‘Apur Sansar’ being the inaugural film. 

In her inaugural address from state secretariat Nabanna, Banerjee asked the cinema hall owners to maintain all safety protocols including regular sanitisation of the theatres as they open it to full occupancy. She asked Chief Secretary Alapan Bandopadhyay to issue a notification regarding the new occupancy limit.

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Theatre owners had recently written a letter to the chief minister requesting her to allow full occupancy of the establishments, citing lesser revenues since the reopening of theatres in October last year and no known instance of the spread of COVID-19 through cinema halls.

Banerjee suggested organisers that apart from issuing e-passes for seeing films in state-run auditoriums in Nandan-Rabindra Sadan and Rabindra Okakura Bhavan, they should spare some thought for people who are not well-versed with technology and suggested if some films could be screened at the open-air theatre in Nandan.

She added that the West Bengal government has hosted the 26th KIFF on a smaller scale at a time when many organisers of other film festivals have cancelled their events. 

Banerjee paid tributes to legendary actor Soumitra Chatterjee, who died due to post-COVID complications last year, and other luminaries and said a section will be dedicated to their works.

Noting that the Bengali film industry, popularly known as Tollywood, has one of the best talents in the world, Banerjee said, “One day we will beat Bollywood, Hollywood to occupy the number one position in the world.”

“We had West Bengal’s pride Uttam Kumar, Soumitra Chatterjee and Suchitra Sen in the past, and presently have Madhabi Mukherjee and Sabitri Chatterjee among others,” she said.

Khan, who is West Bengal’s brand ambassador, attended the ceremony from Mumbai. Banerjee invited him to visit the state during Raksha Bandhan and next year’s KIFF, to which he replied in affirmative.

The actor has been attending the film festival since 2011 but could not visit Kolkata this year due to the pandemic situation.

Bengali actors June Malia and Parambrata Chatterjee hosted the inauguration programme at Nandan in the presence of filmmakers Goutam Ghose, Raj Chakraborty, Arindam Sil and actors Rituparna Sengupta, Dev, Soham and Paoli Dam among others.

A short film with snippets from different movies of Soumitra Chatterjee and his stage production on King Leer with his voice-over was screened at the programme.

All the attendees wore masks and maintained social distancing.

Films will be screened at Rabindra Sadan, Nandan, Sisir Mancha and Rabindra Okakura Bhavan in Salt Lake.

Six films by Italian filmmaker Federico Fellini and movies on sitarist Ravi Shankar, singer Hemanta Mukherjee and flicks of comedian Bhanu Bandyopadhyay will be screened.