I am really happy today as after a long persuasion the new Maharashtra government under the leadership of Honorable CM Shri Devendra Fadnavis as well as the Industries Minister Shri Subash Desai along with the complete team has duly respected and raised the cause of techo-creative industry – Animation, Visual Effects, Gaming & Comics (AVGC) by giving AVGC a great status in Maharashtra IT/ITES 2015 policy.
This is the first state government ever looking at an incubation equity fund, entertainment tax exemption, going in the details of Animation, VFX, Gaming & Comics definitions and covering 2D to 3D conversion etc in the policy.
While a great amount of work is happening at the central level to form the National Centre of Excellence for AVGC, Co-production treaties with Canada, China & Korea for audio- visual co-productions have already been signed since the new government has come in the last one year. The effort now is to sign audio-visual co-production treaties with Japan, Israel, and among a few Latin American & Caribbean countries now, which will go a long way for the upliftment of the AVGC sector.
AVGC skill development will also get a great boost as even the State Governments are pushing the cause of Skilling deeper. With Media & Entertainment Skill Council under the National Skill Development Council & newly formed Ministry of Skill Development and Entrepreneurship the agenda of creative-art-performing arts skilling in particularly going to find a level playing field at par with science and commerce. The Maharashtra IT-ITES Policy 2015 addresses the skilling issue in the sector and focuses on PPP initiatives also.
Promoting Maharashtra as a hub of AVGC is critical and the Maharashtra IT-ITES Policy 2015 not only gives an opportunity to set-up AVGC parks but also promotes several events like FICCI FRAMES- Best Animated Frames Awards, NASSCOM Game Developer’s Conference, MCCIA -Digital & Creative Content Conference, TASI’s – Anifest, ASIFA – World Animation Day & NASSCOM Indian Leadership Forum by becoming a Host State not only sponsoring Rs 10 lakh every year for the next five years for each year but also waiving off the entertainment tax for these events. Even positioning of Maharashtra in the national and international events is adequately covered in this policy. The AVGC studios formed in the state of Maharashtra will also get market promotion assistance through this policy.
Over all the Maharashtra IT-ITES Policy 2015 is great for the IT, ITES sectors, specially the AVGC stakeholders. Many other states are now working on the IT, ITES policy with a special focus on AVGC; Goa and Haryana are also in the process of releasing a great policy. Andhra Pradesh, Karnataka and Telengana already have a great policy in place. So it’s very encouraging to see this sector getting the much needed attention.
Ashish S Kulkarni, founder, Punnaryug & chairman, FICCI, AVGC Forum