kolkata the culture hub of nandan will cease to be the focal point of the kolkata film festival kff this year it will be reduced to just another theatre for screening as both the opening and closing ceremonies have been moved to the science city auditorium this is the first time since 1995 that the closing ceremony is not being held at nandan last year the film festival was inaugurated at netaji indoor stadium in keeping with chief minister mamata banerjees desire to strip it of its elitist veneer and take it to the masses the mamata government has decided to demolish the nandan complex a favourite of former cm buddhadeb bhattacharjee to build a highrise cultural centre only rabindra sadan and academy of fine arts will be spared the bulldozer the weeklong film carnival accredited by the international federation of film producers association fiapf paris will be inaugurated at netaji indoor stadium in the presence of amitabh bachchan shah rukh khan and kamal haasan on november 10 the decision to strip nandan of the closing ceremony has triggered much debate this way nandan is bound to lose much of its relevance in the kff said biplab sen a film buff but the administration says their decision is logical the idea is to hold the mega event at a place which has better parking facilities unlike the nandan complex science city also has a higher capacity than nandan and the ambience is better a government official said no wonder kolkata police too prefers managing the crowd at science city rather than the cramped nandan complex nandan thus will be one of the many kff screening halls like rabindra sadan sishir mancha madhusudan mancha bioscope inox and navina the cm will probably not need to visit nandan at all for the festival this year said an official the festival will open with rituparno ghoshs unreleased satire taak jhaank which brings together jaya bachchan and naseeruddin shah for the first time the closing film is yet to be decided the 19th kff will mark the closing of the 100 years of indian cinema with the screening of postpather panchali classics by bengali filmmakers in a specially built tent the list begins with phani majumdar the pioneer and s mukherjee bimal roy basu bhattacharya hrishikesh mukherjee amiya chakraborty asit sen and basu chatterjee interestingly the panorama includes bhuban shome by mrinal sen who the mamata government had dropped from permanent membership of the kff committee earlier this year along with soumitra chatterjee tarun majumdar and buddhadeb dasgupta kff 19 has a new logo and will host the first satyajit ray memorial lecture with sharmila tagore as the speaker the theme song will be a tribute to singer manna dey who died last week composed and sung by nachiketa it incorporates a famous line from deys number jibone ki pabo na it will be played before each film show addressing a press meet on friday nachiketa said the song was recomposed in