Pune, March 4 (Agency) Celebrated lyricist Javed Akhtar on Friday highlighted the need for creating single screen theatres to ensure that even small budget films can be released and make profit. Emphasising on the losses incurred by multiplexes and filmmakers during the pandemic, he said that establishing theatres have become the need of the hour. “In a vast country like India, there are only a few thousand theatres. This limits the distribution of the film and also its access to commoners. It is important that state and central governments take an initiative to develop a policy to establish small theatres across India, to enable the release of even smaller films. Financing a film should not be the focus but releasing it should be,” said Akhtar. The acclaimed poet and screenplay writer was speaking at the ongoing 20th Pune International Film Festival (PIFF) here. Akhtar spoke at length about the importance of language, while responding to the queries about today’s language on the streets and social media being loud and not profound. He said, “It is not the fault of the current generation but of people from my generation who were engrossed in achieving material wealth. In this process, we did not teach the importance of language to the younger generation.
We discouraged them from reading poetry or performing an art. We made them a generation that is only capable of earning wealth that can be stored in the banks.” This has made the young generation lose the connection to their mother tongue, he said. “Language is a vehicle of culture and tradition. It is a medium that gives us wisdom and ethos. Only that person who knows his mother tongue can have a rooted identity. It is important to teach children their own language,” said Akhtar. Akhtar also spoke about the recent trend of films from regional languages being dubbed in Hindi and finding success at the box office. He said, “Only when you break the language barrier, you know that there are other people that are doing great work.” He added that when he first came to Mumbai, he discovered Marathi theatre and plays written by Vijay Tendulkar. “I had never seen plays and dramas like that. I truly believe that Vijay Tendulkar is the greatest playwright of India and that is why I created a Vijay Tendulkar Rangmanch in Mumbai from the fund that I received as an MP.”