The steel city is also keeping its fingers crossed hoping that actress Raveena Tandon will inaugurate the festival on December 10

Jamshedpur, Oct. 28: Bollywood’s mast mast girl is likely to stump the steel city in December.

The East Singhbhum district administration and the Celluloid Chapter of the city have decided to request actress Raveena Tandon, who is also the chairperson of the National Children’s Film Society (NCFS), to inaugurate the children’s film festival, scheduled to begin here from December 10.

The decision was taken today at a meeting, which was presided over by deputy commissioner Nidhi Khare. The authorities of 20 schools and officials of the Celluloid Chapter and the district administration were present at the meeting, which discussed the forthcoming 10-day festival.

“The district administration will write to Tandon within a couple of days requesting her to be the chief guest at the inaugural ceremony,” district officials said.

“Tandon is the right person to inaugurate the festival as she is the chairperson of NCFS that provides us with the films that will be screened at the festival and also the financial assistance. Moreover, we want Tandon to witness the overwhelming response that the festival receives every year. As many as 25,000 schoolchildren from the city and 7,000 from the rural areas attend the festival,” said a senior district official.

The highlight of this year’s festival will be a jury comprising two to three students who will see the films and prepare a report. The local newspapers will be requested to publish the report.

According to general secretary of the Celluloid Chapter of the city Amitava Ghosh, 10 movies will be screened at the festival. The centre of attraction will be two Iranian films dubbed in Hindi — Chote Miya Suhan Allah and The Fish.

The Hindi films to be screened, include Baaja, which has won a national award in the children’s film category, Sixer, Neel Parbath ke Paar, Kala Parbath and Dharti Maa.

“We are trying to screen a few more films like Maakri,” said Ghosh and added that the final list of films to be shown at the festival will be prepared within a few weeks.

“Most of the films will be screened in the auditoriums of schools like Loyola, Sacred Heart Convent, Rajendra Vidyalaya and Jamshedpur Public School. Some movies will also be shown at the cinema halls in the city,” he added.