TCAA to raise funds for artistes welfare

CHARTING A NEW COURSE

The newly-formed Telangana Cinema Artistes Association has decided to produce a feature film to make money to create corpus fund for the body

Hyderabad: The newly-formed Telangana Cinema Artistes Association (TCAA) has embarked on an ambitious plan to produce feature films on a shoestring budget to create corpus fund for the Association.

Usually, the movie artistes raise funds through star nights or star cricket matches. But, the Telangana State artistes have decided to take the new path to raise the corpus fund for the Association. “Ours is a new body and we need corpus fund to help 200-and-odd artistes.

Instead of organizing star night, we have resolved to make a good film and accumulate Rs 4-5 crore as corpus fund. The fund will be used to subscribe to mediclaim policy on behalf of our members, pay insurance premiums and pensions to 60-plus artistes, etc,” said Sangakumar, president of the Telangana Cinema Artistes Association.

“With horror comedies like Geetanjali rocking box office, I penned a horror-comedy to ensure a sure-fire way to click at the box office. Hotelier-and-actor Nagaraj is also investing his money to make it a commercial entertainer. Telangana actors Akash and Poonam Kumar would be playing lead roles and we would select rest of the cast from our 200-odd members post audition”, he added.

However, they intend to pump in Rs 1 crore since they have to spend money on locations, costumes, crew members, etc., even though they are paying nominal fee to cameraman, music director and others. “Everyone is co-operating to make our endeavour a success and shooting will commence in two weeks” he said.

When contacted, seasoned director Sana Yadi Reddy confirmed that he would be directing this film without charging a fee. “It is meant for a good cause. I am glad to be associated with such a commendable initiative and script has a good potential too,” he felt.

By BVS Prakash