SiGNS Film Festival begins in Kerala, Haobam Paban Kumar honoured as Jury Chairperson

The eighteenth edition of SiGNS, India’s first film festival exclusively dedicated to digital video documentaries and short films, commenced this evening at Anurag Cinemas, Shornur, in Kerala’s Palakkad district. The five-day festival will run from February 6 to February 10, with film screenings being held across two screens at the venue.
The festival is organised by the Federation of Film Societies of India, Kerala Region, with support from the Kerala State Chalachitra Academy. This year’s edition will feature fourteen documentaries and seventeen short films in the competition section. In addition, twenty-eight documentaries and twenty-four short films will be screened under the non-competition category.
Altogether, more than one hundred films drawn from national and international selections will be showcased during the festival. Directors of films selected for competition will introduce their works and engage in interactive sessions with the audience.
Several curated packages form part of the festival programme, including an international package of seven films curated by Premendra Mazumdar, Artistic Director of the festival and Vice President of the Federation of Film Societies of India. A Contemporary Indian Documentary package curated by documentary filmmaker Rajesh James will feature four films, while a special collection of fifteen Haiku films curated by the Palakkad Insight Creative Group has also been included.
Assam’s first woman filmmaker and noted award winner Manju Bora is the Chief Guest of this year’s festival. Renowned Manipuri documentary filmmaker Haobam Paban Kumar has been honoured as the Jury Chairperson. Other jury members include film society activist and critic P Premachandran and Bengal-based filmmaker Debjani Banerjee, who is also a faculty member at the K R Narayanan Film Institute. Select works by Haobam Paban Kumar and Debjani Banerjee will also be screened.
The festival will present the John Abraham National Award for Best Documentary and Best Short Film, along with other national and regional awards. More than six hundred delegates, including filmmakers, students, cultural activists and film society members, are attending the festival.