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Debate

Will privatisation help the NFDC?
The reference made by the Information and Broadcasting Minister, Arun Jaitley, in Mumbai, recently to the possible privatisation of the National Film Development Corporation (NFDC), the International Film Festival Of India (IFFI) and the Film and Television Institute of India (FTII) may have been in the nature of "thinking aloud" but are there any buyers for his idea? Sad to say, there appear to be none. In so far as the commercial movie moghuls are concerned, they seem to be the least interested in either the NFDC or the FTII as they regard both bodies as deadwood...

ACCORDING to the movie moghuls, the disinvestment of other public sector units (PSUs) with which Arun Jaitley is concerned is another matter because those units deal with commodities or goods whereas the NFDC is a development organisation and what it sells is films made for a particular clientale or discerning audiences and as such its marketability is limited. The NFDC’s other activities are in the nature of a service industry such as supplying films to Doordarshan for telecast or subtitling of films.

As for the IFFI, the film industry is least interested in it because it is aware that none of its films stand any chance of winning an award or even if it does, its market value is in no way enhanced as it happens in the case of an Oscar-winning film. As for the FTII, they feel that it is an educational institute and the government ought to pay more attention to it than the film industry. Maybe, a few of the FTII students have made a name in the film industry, but it should not be forgotten that others, who have had no connection with the FTII, have scaled greater heights.

Who’d want to buy
the NFDC?
SHYAM BENEGAL
Filmmaker Shyam Benegal was of the view that in the present state and condition of the NFDC, no one would be interested even to take a share in it after the disinvestment. "Before thinking about NFDC’s privatisation, one must go back to the days of Independence and ascertain why it came into being. One of the things that bothered the government then was the system that governed film-making. Securing finance was the most crucial aspect but there were no rules or order governing it. In such a context, making quality films was out of the question because films were totally market-oriented. Only films with an assured market value were financed. Under the circumstances, a system of financing quality films valuable to society had to be worked out. The Film Finance Corporation (FFC) was set up as per the recommendation of the Film Enquiry Committee, headed by SK Patil. It was decided that finance should be made available to socially significant films which could not otherwise get finance. But things did not work out that way and the objective for which the NFDC was set up remained unfulfilled. In the debate that ensued, it was felt that as cinema was market oriented, it was necessary to devise a system not only to finance films but also to produce them. Outlets for exhibiting these films was another vexing issue. The country did not have the sufficient number of cinemas. While the southern states had more cinemas, states like Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan, Uttar Pradesh and Bihar had less. The FFC’s second objective was thus to help the construction of more cinemas in the country. In order to achieve both these objectives, the government appointed the Indian Motion Picture Export Corporation (IMPEC). But the objective to build more cinemas did not work out because of its failure to identify the areas in which cinemas were needed. The NFDC did not undertake any study to ascertain why cinemas were fewer in states like Rajasthan or other northern states for the last 50 years. In the absence of such a study, cinemas were built in places where they were not needed. A lot of money was pumped into films in the absence of outlets, resulting in a backlog of films, which could have been avoided had theatre construction been properly planned and executed. There was an audience to see those NFDC films but it remained untapped as no marketing strategy was worked out. A corporate body is supposed to take its own decisions but this right was denied to NFDC by the Government. Policy decisions were made by the ministry itself when those should have been made by the board of the NFDC. This is a problem which all the Public Sector Undertakings are facing. For every policy decision the NFDC board had to seek the Government’s approval. The Corporation was never left free to work on its own. Apart from this, the expenditure incurred by the NFDC went up while the exploitation part did not take off. Albeit all this, the government cannot disband the NFDC. At no time has the government bothered to find out why so many people are working in an organisation. Whenever some official tried to weed out unwanted people, the labour union came in the way blocking their removal. The government still wants that quality films should be made. The idea has not been given up. But it has failed because of the lack of proper marketing strategy.

In the case of the FTII, the problem is the same. In the first place, the FTII should not have been under the ministry of information and broadcasting. It is an educational institute and should be either under the ministry of education or culture or under an university whereby all the rules governing an university would have applied to it. Then again, because the government is acting as a controlling authority and not as a regulatory authority, the FTII’s functioning has been adversely affected. Mohan Agashe is trying his level best to keep the Institute in a proper shape but the government doesn’t want to lose its hold," said Shyam Benegal.

The NFDC is no PEPSIco
Amol Palekar
Well-known filmmaker and actor Amol Palekar questions the very concept of privatisation. "Why does the Government want to wash its hands off its responsibility, especially when it is committed to developing the motion picture industry? Isn’t it the moral responsibility of the government to fund activities relating to the making of artistic films? Why is it not fulfilling that obligation? Or is it that it doesn’t want to admit that films are not a priority in their list when it comes to the development of films? The NFDC and the National Film Archive of India (NFAI) are institutions of national pride. But the government is talking in terms of their viability. It is judging the NFDC and the NFAI on the lines of Pepsi and Coco Cola. Whether the NFDC is properly managed or not is not the issue. The pertinent issue is whether the government has undertaken a proper review of the organisation’s activities and rechecked whether it is doing the job assigned to it, namely, the development of the film industry. Even assuming that there are a few inefficient officials, it doesn’t mean that the NFDC should be wound up or privatised. The correct procedure would be to remove the inefficient persons and replace them by competent and capable ones who can efficiently run the organisation. How come the NFDC was functioning properly when Hrishikesh Mukherjee was its chairman? The industry would like the government to ascertain why the NFDC is not running properly and thereafter take steps to set matters right. How can the government expect any organisation to function properly when it doesn’t appoint a chairman and board (of directors) for years together?" Palekar asked.

Wind up the flop show
SHYAM SHROFF
SHYAM Shroff says the best thing to do is to wind up the NFDC. "There is no point in pumping money into the NFDC anymore. It must either go commercial or else face closure. If it is privatised, who is there to buy its shares?," asks Shroff.



Privatisation is a kneejerk reaction
Govind Nihalani
GOVIND Nihalani said that if the government is thinking in terms of disinvestment of NFDC, it means acceptance of the failure of the government machinery. "I don’t think privatisation is the answer to the failure of its machinery. Commerce should not be the prime factor for an organisation meant for developmental and cultural activity. The government has a responsibility towards society. There must be a political will to turn around the institution rather than commercialise the developmental goal for which the NFDC was set up. The government has a certain responsibility and should not deviate from its original path," said Nihalani.

MSM Desai