Advisory Team
Ketan Mehta
The internationally acclaimed film director Ketan Mehta has made landmark historical films like Sardar Patel, Mangal Pandey, Mirch Masala, Maya Memsaab amongst many others. The French Govt too has honored him with the officer the arts and litrature award! He is the promoter of India’s largest animation studio Cosmos-Maya. An Economics graduate from St. Stephens College, Delhi University. He studied Film Direction at the FTII, the premier Film & TV Institute of India.
He has so far directed 11 feature films, many of them have won national and international awards and have received international acclaim. He has also produced and directed many TV series, Documentaries, and ads.
He has been a consultant to the National Doordarshan News Channel, and Directorate of Film Festivals. He has also served as a jury member at International Film festivals. He has also been on the governing council of the Film and Television Institute of India and the chairperson of the NATIONAL Film Awards.
He has introduced numerous key talents to the Film industry like Amir Khan, Shankar Ahsaan loy, Johnny Lever, Ashutosh Gowarikar, Shah Rukh’s first feature film was also made by Ketan Mehta.
His animation studio is the force behind iconic series like Motu Patlu- which has been running for 12 years now. He was chairman of National awards Jury 2023.
Prashant Nanda
For the last half a century Prashant Nanda is a household name in Odisha as an actor, director and producer. He made his celluloid debut in 1959 with Kaviraj Krushna Chandra Tripathy’s Odia movie Dasyu Ratnakar. In 1962, he debuted as a lead actor with Odia movie Nua Bou. His three movies, Nua Bou (1962), Matira Manisha (1966) and Adina Megha (1970) got three times National Film Award for Best Feature Film in Odia within just eight years. He turned a director in 1976 with the blockbuster hit movie Shesha Shrabana. Then he went on to direct hits like Hisab Nikas, Balidan, Swapna Sagara, Maa O Mamata, Dora to name a few.
He had worked predominantly in Odia film industry but also worked in Bengali film industry and Hindi film industry extensively. In 1979, he directed and acted as male lead in Naiyya (Hindi remake of Shesha Shrabana) released in the year 1979.
He was also a Member of Parliament at Rajya Sabha, the upper house of the Indian Parliament, for Odisha.
Shoma Chatterjee
Shoma A. Chatterji is a Kolkata-based freelance journalist, author and film scholar. She contributes mainly on cinema, to various outlets. She has won the National Awards for Best Writing on Cinema twice – in 1991 and again in 2002. She has authored 32 published titles of which a major slice is on Indian Cinema.
Amit Rai
Amit Rai is an Indian film director and writer who made his debut as director in 2010 with the Hindi film, “Road to Sangam’. For this film, Amit received Gollapudi Srinivas Award in 2010 and Audience Choice Award in Mumbai International Film Festival in the year 2009. Amit went on to direct his second film I- PAD, which got huge appreciation and participated in different film festivals including IFFI.
In 2023, Amir Rai became a household name with his blockbuster film OMG -2. Amit bagged Film Fare award for Best Story for OMG – 2 and came to be known as a filmmaker of huge talent. He also received the Best Director Award from Iconic Gold Award in the year 2024. Amit Rai is the screenplay writer of the Film “Dear Jassi” directed by renowned director Tarsem Singh. The film received Best film at Toronto International Film festivals in the year 2023. Amit also produced short films, “the pursuit of Light,” Color Black and many more under his production house, “Babulal Biascope”
