Mumbai: Filmmaker Rajendra Singh Babu says the jury of Indian International Film Festival (IFFI) has been transparent in its selection of the movies for Indian Panaroma section, amid criticism from eminent directors like Adoor Gopalakrishnan and Buddhadeb Dasgupta, whose films have been rejected at the festival.
Adoor and Buddhadeb submitted Pinneyum and Tope respectively for the competition section, which had 238 other films in the running, but failed to get into the final list.
Babu, who is the jury chairperson for feature section, says they followed guidelines while selecting films and were transparent about it.
"I can speak on the whole and not on individual basis. On the basis of the guideline that we were given, we selected the films. We had an excellent jury, which consisted of actors, directors and film critics. We were very fair, transparent and open. The films speak for itself," Babu told PTI.
A 13-member jury has selected 22 films.
The members of the jury board includes actress Rama Vij, director Arup Manna, producer-director C.V. Reddy, producer and director Girish Mohite and writer and filmmaker Uday Shankar Pani.
Some of the films in the competition are Goutam Ghose's Shankhachil, Kaushik Ganguly's Vastusaap, Saibal Mitra's Chitrokar, Manas Mukul Pal's Shahaj Pather Golpo, Sultan, Airlift and Bajirao Mastani.
Babu said that it is for the first time 242 films were submitted for the competition.
"Every year, around 170 movies are submitted but because of digital revolution, this time we had 262 entries. Out of that 15 films were rejected on the basis of technical reasons. So, we were left with 240 films. We tried to get the best out of it. We were not under any influence," he said.
About the Hindi films in the section, Babu said that they were selected by the Film Federation of India (FFI) but IFFI jury is also satisfied with them.
Arvind Sinha, the head of the non-feature section of Indian Panaroma, meanwhile said that the documentary culture in the country has grown over the years.
"With time, documentaries have evolved in our country and that's how it should be. We picked the best of the films and we are happy with the selection," he said.
IFFI will commence on November 20 and close on November 28, in Goa.
(With agency inputs)