NEW DELHI: Ziyarat, the first feature film to be made by a Kashmiri
director and starring only Kashmiri artistes which has already won an
award in the United States, has been invited to the Dhaka
International Film Festival early next year.

The film, directed by Suresh K Goswami who also wrote the story, will
have a limited release in the country in Delhi and Mumbai in the first
phase and later in Jammu and Kashmir.

Noting that a film of this nature may not have a mass appeal, Goswami
told indiantelevision.com that he expected to release the film on 21
October with about ten prints in Delhi and Mumbai, and later a bigger
release in Jammu and Kashmir.

Goswami said the research on the film had taken a year after which he
shot the film in eight days in December last and did the
post-production in just over three months. He said the film had just
three professional actors, the rest being either newcomers or people
living in relief camps.

Answering a question, he said he did not face any hurdles while
shooting on actual locations in the valley and Jammu, and the Central
Board of Film Certification had only asked him to tone down the
dialogues at one or two places.

Essentially a story based on the plight of Kashmiri pundits who had to
flee the valley and are now living miserable lives in refugee camps,
the film won ‘Honorable Mention‘ at the Famewalk International Film
Festival in Los Angeles on 22 July 2011.

The story revolves around young Muslim Abdul Qadir and his wife Mariam
who are searching for their friends - Pandit Dinanath and his wife
Girija who had fled the valley when their family became a victim of
militancy. Mariam has brought up Posh, the son of Pandit and his wife
who had thought their child had been killed.