An inter-ministerial empowered committee will be set up soon to facilitate single-window clearance of applications by foreign filmmakers seeking to shoot their movies in India.
“We are in the process of issuing a notification shortly in this regard,” Information and Broadcasting Minister Manish Tewari said at a function organised here to release the Limca Book of Records, 2013. The proposed committee would include representatives of the state governments and “key” central government ministries, he added.
This comes over a year after both tourism and information and broadcasting ministries joined hands to work on a proposal to create a single-window system to give clearance for shooting foreign films in India. The move was purported to attract foreign tourists.
The present process to accord permission to filmmakers for shooting in India is very complex as they have to get clearances from many departments, a tourism ministry official said.
“The creation of such an empowered committee would provide the platform and impetus to promote India as a filming destination across the world,” Tewari said. The Justice Mudgal Committee, set up to review the mandate of the Central Board of Film
Certification (CBFC) and suggest measures to improve its functioning, was expected to submit its report “shortly,” he added.
Among various issues, the committee was looking into the requirement of statutory changes to enable the CBFC deal with contemporary requirements of certification and increased transparency and efficiency.
It will also review the categories of certification, existing and proposed, under the Cinematograph (Amendment) Bill, 2013.
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