The Pune International Film Festival (PIFF) is an annual film festival held in Pune, Maharashtra, India. Open to the general public, screenings take place at venues such as the NFAI, INOX and PVR cinemas across the city. The festival is chaired and directed by Dr Jabbar Patel. The festival's trustees are Jabbar Patel, Satish Alekar, Mohan Agashe, Sabina Sanghvi, Ravi Gupta, Rajendra Kelshikar and Samar Nakhate. The deputy director — Programme and Films is Vishal Shinde, and the deputy director — International Cinema & Relations is Aditi Akkalkotkar.
The festival commences on the second Thursday and concludes on the third Thursday of January. First Edition of PIFF was started in year 2002 and has been running annually except for 2004.
The latest (24th edition) of the PIFF took place from 15th to 22nd January 2026.
Festival categories
World Competition - Films released in earlier year compete for much-coveted 'Prabhat Best International Film Award' Marathi Competition - Marathi films released in earlier year compete for 'Sant Tukaram Best International Marathi Film Award' Student Section - Short films from film schools in India like FTII are screened. Global Cinema - Non-competition category for cinema around the globe Country Focus - A handful of films from one country Theme Section - Films relating to the theme of the festival that year Retrospective - Retrospective on Indian and Foreign director/actor Indian Cinema - Offbeat films produced in India (usually excludes Bollywood and other Indian language mainstream films) Tribute Section - Tribute to film personalities passed that year Special Screening PIFF Workshops - Talks, Seminars, and Workshops on varied subjects by Film Industry persons. Student Animation Section - Short animation films for competition by students.This section was for few years.
Awards Government of Maharashtra Prabhat Best International Film Government of Maharashtra Prabhat Best International Film Director Government of Maharashtra Sant Tukaram Best International Marathi Film
Sant Tukaram Best International Marathi Film Award winners
Since 2006, the Government of Maharashtra started awarding the best film in the Marathi competition section at the festival. An international jury watches the competing Marathi films to decide the winner. The award is named after the Marathi film Sant Tukaram, the first Indian entry to be screened at the 5th Venice International Film Festival.
+Award-winners PIFF Edition Year Film Director Ref. 4 2006 Dombivali FastNishikanth Kamat 5 2007 ShevriGajendra Ahire 6 2008 TingyaMangesh Hadawale 7 2009 Gabhricha PausSatish Manwar 8 2010 NatarangRavi Jadhav 9 2011 Baboo Band BaajaRajesh Pinjani 10 2012 Ha Bharat MazaSumitra Bhave, Sunil Sukhtankar 11 2013 KaksparshMahesh Manjrekar 12 2014 FandryNagraj Manjule 13 2015 Elizabeth EkadashiParesh Mokashi 14 2016 Rangaa PatangaaPrasad Namjoshi 15 2017 Lathe Joshi Mangesh Joshi 16 2018 PimpalGajendra Ahire 17 2019 Chumbak Sandeep Modi 18 2020 Anandi GopalSameer Vidwans19 2021 Happy My Son (Porga Majetay) Makarand Mane 20 2022 Potra Shankar Arjunn Dhotre
Prabhat International Award Winners The festival started an International Competition section from 2005. The Government of Maharashtra started awarding the best film and the best director in the International Competition. An international jury panel decides the awards. Select awards are listed below.
Edition Year Award Film Director Ref. 3 2005 Best Film YesterdayDarrell Roodt Jury Award Earth and Ashes Atiq Rahimi Best Director Dias de Santiago Josué Méndez 4 2006 Best Film L'Enfant (The Child) Jean-Pierre & Luc Dardenne Best Director L'Enfant (The Child) Jean-Pierre & Luc Dardenne 5 2007 Best Film The Old Barber Hasi Chaolu Best Director The Axe Costa-Gavras 6 2008 Best Film XXY Lucía Puenzo Best Director Sleepwalking Land Teresa Prata 7 2009 Best Film Lake Tahoe Fernando Eimbcke Best Director Tulpan Sergey Dvortsevoy 8 2010 Best Film White Lightnin' Dominic Murphy Best Director Who Is Afraid of the Wolf? Maria Procházková 9 2011 Best Film Dooman River Zhang Lu Best Director Reverse Borys Lankosz 10 2012 Best Film If Not Us, Who? Andres Veiel Best Director A Separation Asghar Farhadi 11 2013 Best Film Barbara Christian Petzold Best Director The Delay Rodrigo Plá 12 2014 Best Film Papusza Krzysztof Krauze & Joanna Kos-Krauze Best Director (shared) Papusza Krzysztof Krauze & Joanna Kos-Krauze Best Director (shared) Foreign Bodies Mirko Locatelli 13 2015 Best Film Behaviour Ernesto Daranas Best Director (shared) Like Never Before Zdeněk Tyc Best Director (shared) Test (Ispytanie) Alexander Kott 14 2016 Best Film Immortal Seyed Hadi Mohaghegh Best Director Thithi Raam Reddy 152017Best FilmLost in MunichPetr ZelenkaBest DirectorThe StudentKirill Serebrennikov162018Best FilmFree and EasyGeng JunBest DirectorZamaLucrecia Martel172019Best FilmGirls of the SunEva HussonBest DirectorA TranslatorRodrigo Barriuso & Sebastian Barriuso182020Best FilmA Son (Bik Eneich: Un Fils)Mehdi BarsaouiBest DirectorSupernovaBartosz Kruhlik192021Best FilmShould the Wind Drop (French: Si le vent tombe)Nora MartirosyanBest DirectorBarah By BarahGaurav Madan202022Best FilmBetween Two Dawns Selman NacarBest Director107 MothersPeter Kerekes
PIFF Distinguished Award PIFF Distinguished Award for Outstanding Contribution to Indian Cinema. Edition YearAwardeesReferences 1 2002 Dilip Kumar Mrinal Sen 2 2003 Lata Mangeshkar Dev Anand 3 2005 Waheeda Rehman Shakti Samanta 4 2006 Vyjayantimala Yash Chopra 5 2007 Asha Parekh Dharmendra 6 2008 Sharmila Tagore Shammi Kapoor 7 2009 Shashi Kapoor Sulochana Didi Hema Malini 8 2010 Shriram Lagoo Rajesh Khanna 9 2011 Shashikala Saira Banu 10 2012 Amitabh Bachchan Asha Bhosale 11 2013 Ramesh Deo Jeetendra 12 2014 Adoor Gopalakrishnan Vinod Khanna 13 2015 N. D. Mahanor Shatrughan Sinha Tanuja Mukerjee Krzysztof Zanussi 14 2016 Soumitra Chatterjee Shyam Benegal 15 2017 Aparna Sen Seema Deo 16 2018 Ramesh Prasad Ramesh Sippy Rajdutt 17 2019 Dilip Prabhavalkar Govind Nihalani 18 2020 B. P. Singh Vikram Gokhale 19 2021 Ashok Saraf 23 2025 Anupam Kher Shubha Khote
S.D. Burman PIFF Award
Edition YearAwardeesReferences 8 2010 Pyarelal Sharma 9 2011 Mohammed Zahur Khayyam 10 2012 Ilaiyaraaja 11 2013 Shivkumar Sharma Hariprasad Chaurasia 12 2014 Hridaynath Mangeshkar 13 2015 Anandji Virji Shah 14 2016 Uttam Singh 15 2021 Zakir Hussain 16 2017 S. P. Balasubrahmanyam 17 2018 Raamlaxman 18 2019 Usha Khanna 23 2025 Kavita Krishnamurti
See also Marathi cinema Cinema of India Film festival
References
External links of PIFF, India