Jugglers, acrobats, jazz artists to enliven IFFI this year

PANAJI - With jazz artists playing saxophones and trombones strolling on the streets and jugglers, fire eaters, acrobats prancing around, there will be much more than just movies at the International Film Festival of India (IFFI) 2010 starting here

Nov 22.

The Entertainment Society of Goa (ESG), which hosts the IFFI, has tied up with the Goa Chamber of Commerce and Industry (GCCI) to liven up the two major towns of Goa - Panaji and Margao - during the film festival from Nov 22 to Dec 2.

We are involving the retail businessmen in this festival. Heavy discounts would be offered during the festival days to the delegates and general public so that the retail business gets a boost in the city during the IFFI period, GCCI chairman Cesar Menezes said at a press conference here Wednesday.

The aim is to ensure that the retail businessmen also reap in the footfalls triggered by the film festival. So along with the discounts for IFFI delegates and other film buffs, we will also have a food court specialising in Goan cuisine and all sorts of entertainment on four major commercial streets in Panaji and Margao, Kirit Maganlal, who is the chairman of the GCCI’s retail committee said.

We hope along with the films a lot of folks will be driven in by the 20 to 30 percent discount which we will be giving out as part of the shopping festival, Maganlal said, adding that they were attempting to replicate the Dubai shopping festival model for the event.

Maganlal also said that IFFI provided for a great branding and marketing opportunity for the retail business in Panaji, which hosts the film festival ever since it was permanently moved to Goa some years back.

We introduced this shopping festival last year and we could make out there was an upward growth in business by more than five per cent, he said.

— Indo Asian News Service