According to Union Minister Anurag Singh Thakur, the media and entertainment ecosystem is a rising sector that will generate Rs 4 lakh crore annually by 2025 and grow to Rs 7.5 lakh crore by 2030. The Minister for Information and Broadcasting also stated that the country’s rapidly expanding digital infrastructure, as well as ongoing advancements in the AVGC (animation, visual effects, gaming, and comics) sector, has the potential to make India the preferred post-production hub for the media and entertainment industries.
He was delivering the key note address at the National Conference on ’Changing Landscape of Media and Entertainment 2022’ organised by the Symbiosis Skill and Professional University in Pune. The government has designated audio-visual services as one of the 12 Champion Service Sectors and announced key policy measures aimed at nurturing sustained growth.
Requires a specific set of skills and competencies in this sector
“Many job roles have emerged in the field video editing, colour grading, visual effects (VFX), sound design, rotoscoping, 3-D modeling, etc. Each job role in this sector requires a specific set of skills and competencies. It is imperative for the industry and academia to come together and design programmes relevant to the needs of this sector,” Thakur added.
The government is also exploring new partnerships with the private sector to ensure Indian students are in tune with the upcoming technology trends in the sector.
India is ready to become a content creation hub
Stating that the content creation industry in India has undergone a massive uplift with ’Digital India’, Thakur said, “With quality content, easy access and an eager audience, India is ready to narrate its own success story and become a content creation hub.”
He said that India was chosen as first ever Country of Honour at the Cannes Film festival and the Indian delegation walked the red carpet as pan-India flavour not as Bollywood as they call it. Speaking about the growing start-up eco-system in India, it has been said that even during the pandemic, India added as many as 50 unicorn start-ups, which speaks volumes about India’s entrepreneurial spirit.
More start-ups emerge from the talent pool produced by leading film schools
Thakur expressed his desire to see more start-ups emerge from the talent pool produced by leading film schools such as FTII and SRFTI. Resul Pookutty, the event’s guest of honour, said educational institutions should revive the ancient Indian tradition of imparting wisdom to students in order for them to face the outside world, in addition to developing skill sets.
“Sound is memory and memory is knowledge. Our Vedas are organised in such a way that those are easily memorable sounds. We are civilisation who has forgotten strength of sound. It doesn’t show in our narrative of cinema, artistic endeavour that is the landscape we need to change,” he stated.
