Special Correspondent

Panaji, Nov 16: International Film Festival of India (IFFI) 2010 will be inaugurated by doyen of Indian film industry Yash
Chopra in Panaji, a senior official said on Monday November 15.

Director of Film Festival S M Khan told reporters that Chopra will be inaugurating the festival on November 23 along with other film
personalities. Khan said that the Opening and Closing Ceremonies of the film festival will have group of film stars felicitated for their contribution to Indian cinema.

D P Reddy, Joint secretary (Films) Information and Broadacasting Ministry, was also present for the briefing along with Manoj
Srivastava, Chief Executive officer of Entertainment Society of Goa (ESG), a co-host for the event.

The director said that IFFI will be annually felicitating filmstars during its Opening and Closing ceremonies, a practice that was
discontinued in the festival. Ten day long film festival scheduled to be held from November 22 to December 3 will be having 70 to 80 films to be screened in the Cinema of the World Section.

Khan said that this time record number of 450 entries came for this section and final list was chalked out by preview committee of 20 eminent persons from the industry.

He said that 15 films from different countries including three Indian films will be competing for the International Competition section. Khan said that Orissa will be focus state for the festival as the North Eastern state is celebrating 75 years of its cinema. Prominent films from this state and filmmakers will be making presence for the festival.

The IFFI, this time will also have master classes by filmmaker Boman Irani on acting in Cinema (Comedy in Hindi cinema) on December 1 and Oscar award winner Resul Pookutty on Sound and Technology in Cinema on November 27.