Cannes 2023: Sara Ali Khan, Esha Gupta and others join L Murugan as he inaugurates India pavilion. See pics

Minister of State for Information and Broadcasting L Murugan on Wednesday inaugurated the India Pavilion at the 76th Cannes Film Festival. Joining him at the event were Sara Ali Khan, Khushbu Sundar, Madhur Bhandarkar, Vijay Varma and Manushi Chillar with Esha Gupta. (Also read: Cannes Film Festival live updates)

At the event, Murugan highlighted India’s “timeless tradition of storytelling” that was increasingly being recognised around the world, as per a report in PTI.

“You will not find too many Hollywood films these days that do not have names of Indians in the credits, especially in the VFX and animation departments,” the minister said.

He went on to point out that the foundations of “our creative economy” are so strong that “India is well placed to become the world’s leading content creator”.

Also on the dais at the festival’s opening day was Guillaume Esmiol, the executive director of the Cannes Marche du Film. Esmiol acknowledged that Indian cinema was more and more connected to the global movie business, which makes the country very important for the festival.

In his keynote address, Jawed Ashraf, India’s ambassador to France and the Principality of Monaco, said: “Cinema is intricately, and inextricably, linked to the lives of the people of India.” He added: “Our movie industry is doing a job that diplomats are meant to do: making the world dance to India’s tune.”

Upon her turn to speak, Sara said, “I think as a nation maybe we are not doing enough, and we should be even more proud and vocal of the culture that we do have, that we should be able to bring to the rest of the world. Cinema and art transcends language, regions, nationalities.”

Sara has share multiple looks from the festival so far. She wore an Abu Jani Sandeep Khosla lehenga on day one that earned her some praise and also some criticism for her simple, traditional choice.