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A folk musical programme was held at the Chitra Shala Plaza of the Bangladesh Shilpakala Academy, organised by the Music and Dance Department of the organisation. The four-day festival started on Monday and concluded on Thursday.
   Day three of the programme was as mesmerising and full of excitement as it was during the past two days. It started on schedule at 6:00pm. All the mainstream folk singers of the country were there to perform.
   Winner of ATN Bangla contest ‘Tin Chakar Taroka’, Omar Ali, rendered the song ‘Ujan Ganger Naiyea’ and the crowd responded well to him. He also sang ‘Naiyea re Nayer Badam Tuila Kun Kule Jao Choila’ to great appreciation of the crowd.
   Nasrin Ferdous Chomon and Sabrina Sharmin Shomi sang ‘Shoma Muli Maa’ as a duet and later Shomi’s father MA Khaleq took stage. Sanath Kumar Biswas sang ‘Nakshi Kathar Mathe’.
   Al Afroz Khan Tithi, Iffat Ara Nargis and Fatema Begum Lakshmi sounded well with their numbers. Lakshmi sang a Ferdousi Rahman number, lyrics by Altaf Mahmud, but when asked the name of the song, she simply replied ‘Palli Geeti’. AKM Mustafizur Rahman and Salma Mustafiz together performed a bhawaiya song in traditional costume.
   As it was a purely folk-based programme, the baul singer Akbar Ali
   Shai and his troupe and Arman Pagla Shai were also present to finish off the night.
   On the last, Abdul Halim and Sufia Manowar were slated to perform.

Iranian president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad ordered the removal of the obstacles preventing the screening of Asghar Farhadi’s film ‘About Elly’ at the 27th Fajr International Film Festival.
   The order was issued following the request of the president’s art advisor, Javad Shamaqdari, for the decision.
   ‘President Ahmadinejad has ordered Minister of Culture and Islamic Guidance Mohammad-Hossein Saffar Harandi to let the film go on screen at the festival,’ Shamaqdari said during a press released on Tuesday.
   ‘About Elly’ faced problems in obtaining the Culture Ministry’s approval for participating in the festival due to the appearance of one of the film’s stars, Golshifteh Farahani, in ‘Body of Lies’, a Hollywood film.
   She was the first Iranian actress starred in a Hollywood movie after the 1979 Islamic Revolution.
   ‘Up to now, there is no definite ruling in Iran’s cinema for penalizing actors and actresses who plays in Hollywood films.
   It is not rational to oppose screening a film produced in Iran by Iranian artists because of the presence of an actress who played a minor role in an American film. It is not just to punish others for the error of one person,’ he mentioned.
   ‘For these reasons and also the consequences of this action I wrote a letter to Ahmadinejad asking him to announce his viewpoint on the screening of film,’ he said.
   Saffar Harandi, who is now on a journey at Morocco, has ordered the ministry officials to follow Ahmadinejad’s directions and review the case as soon as possible.
   The film about several families that have traveled to northern Iran to spend their vacations will be screened at the 59th Berlin International Film Festival, which opens next week.

An art competition for children titled ‘Bose Anko’ will be held today at 9:00am on the campus of the Faculty of Fine Art
   of Dhaka University in the city.
   Popular apparel house ‘Nitya Upahar’ will arrange the competition in three groups.
   Three winners of the competition will get chance to visit Jaflong in Sylhet for two nights and three days with their parents.
   The thirty best participants will get special awards and 120 participants will get certificates.
   According to the organisers, artworks of the thirty best participants will be printed on the apparels and other products of the house.
   The artworks will also be displayed at Gallery Nitya Upahar in city’s Shahbagh area.
   Forty percent of the sale money of the artworks will go to the child artists and the rest will go to the social activities, the organisers informed media.
   The organisers have resumed the art com-petition for children, which started from 2005, after the break of one year.

John Landis, who directed Michael Jackson’s ‘Thriller’ music video, is suing the pop star over his share of profits from the short film.
   The film-maker claims he has not received his 50 percent share for at least the past four years from Jackson’s now-defunct company Optimum Productions.
   He also alleges the star does not have the right to license games, toys and comics based on the zombie video.
   Landis is best known for Blues Brothers and An American Werewolf in London.