Centre of excellence for AVGC to be set up in PPP mode

Mumbai, Sep 27 (IANS) Centre has decided to set up a centre of excellence for Animation, Visual Effects, Gaming and Comic (AVGC) in collaboration with private sector.

"I am happy to inform you that we have taken the in-principle decision to set up an AVGC centre of excellence in collaboration with the private sector. We are proposing a 48 per cent stake for the Ministry of Information and Broadcasting, 26 per cent for FICCI and 26 per cent for CII, so that it is the private industry and not the government which leads the AVGC transformation.

"We hope that the Ministry of Information and Broadcasting functions as a catalyst for the upsurge in the media and entertainment industry," said Secretary for Information and Broadcasting, Apurva Chandra, while addressing the inaugural session of FICCI Frames Fast Track 2022 here on Tuesday.

Chandra also announced that Invest India is going to be leveraged in order to bring in higher foreign investment into India in the film sector.

"The ministry has merged various film units; NFDC based in Mumbai is going to be the hub of the cinematic arm of the government. With this, we want to revamp the film facilitation office. We are going to hand this over to Invest India, the main investment arm created by the government," he said.

Chandra said the government will work with the states and formulate a model theatre policy.

"Over the past five-six years, the number of theatres has been on a decline. We need to reverse this trend. We will assign the film facilitation office to work with Invest India to come up with a single-window portal for opening theatres, so that more and more theatres can come up and the public gets more avenues to watch the magic of films in theatres. We will also work with the states to create a model theatre policy, so that the states can adopt and work on the same," he said.

Chandra told the industry members that he had a meeting with some stalwarts of the film industry on the proposed amendments to the Cinematograph Act.

"All the stakeholders present supported the proposed amendments for introduction of anti-piracy provisions and age classification with UA category. With the support of the film industry, we hope to table the amended Bill in the winter session of the parliament," he added.