HYDERABAD - The 3rd International Children Films Festival 2017 was opened on Friday in a ceremony held at Institute of Art and Design University of Sindh Jamshoro.

The two-day festival has been organised by the institute in collaboration with The Little Art, a Lahore-based organization working with international collaborations by closely selecting creative and conceptual films across the globe and exhibiting them at various cities and educational institutions in the country.

Inaugurating the festival, the Vice Chancellor University of Sindh Prof Dr Fateh Muhammad Burfat said his especial pleasure over the way the students in attendance shared ideas regarding the cross-cutting theme projected in the films that were screened on the occasion.

He said that the festival was an appealing way to motivate and inspire awareness among masses, especially the youth, about critical and pressing social issues. He said it was very crucial for children and youth to learn various facets, experiences and challenges of life and also inculcate in them the acumen to overpower the otherwise jeopardizing situations.

He termed films a powerful medium, which could transform minds through its alluring visual impact as research had proven in different world contexts. Dr Burfat said well-known director and actor Syed Yar Muhammad Shah belonged to Sindh but his talent was recognized, initially at Lahore and later acknowledged at various international forums.

The Secretary Board of Revenue Sindh Munawar Ali Mahesar said that he had seen students graduating from the University of Sindh occupying privileged and powerful positions in almost all walk of life including bureaucracy, civil service, entrepreneurship, education and politics.

The Director Development of The Little Art, Lahore Umer Aijaz Khan said that films were effective medium of media through which the extremist attitudes from the youths could be ended easily.

The festival has been organized at Sindh University with the efforts made by Saeed Mangi consecutively for the third year after (its successful holding in 2015 and 2016 at the varsity, he said.

Addressing the ceremony, director and actor Syed Yar Muhammad Shah said Sindh and music were inseparable. He said that he mostly worked in Lahore and stayed everywhere in Pakistan but his soul lives in Sindh.

He urged the university students to try to make short documentaries highlighting social issues which will greatly help them to make movies.

The ceremony was attended by nearly 500 students of the University of Sindh and various schools of Jamshoro who were invited by the programme coordinator Prof Saeed Ahmed Mangi.

The Dean faculty of Arts Dr. Javed Iqbal, Dr Mehmood Mughal, SUTA president Dr Azhar Ali Shah, Prof Naimatullah Khilji, eminent Sindhi vocalist Bedil Masroor and Prof Ghulam Ali Buriro were among the prominent people who attended the ceremony.