Shilpa’s musical foundation was laid as a child in Mumbai when she learnt Hindustani classical music under Pdt. D V Jadhav. Throughout her school and college years, she performed in numerous classical and light vocal concerts and competitions. Just before moving to the US to work as a physical therapist, she had also started making forays into Bollywood by sharing stage, and interacting, with eminent personalities like Sudesh Bhosale and Anu Malik. Shilpa was fortunate to be able to continue with light music performances in the USA and has enjoyed performing with various local groups. She enjoys singing all varieties of light music equally – from semi classical and devotional, to ghazals, to golden oldies as well as latest pop and dance hits.

Suma is an avid theater buff, Suma has been involved in theater since childhood, primarily as an actor. Since her move to the USA in 1979, she has played the leading role in over 20 plays in English, Hindi, and Kannada, plays written by renowned playwrights of India and USA. Suma has produced and directed plays and has been associated with Natya Bharati since its inception.  She is a philanthropist and co-founded Sahara Group which raised funds for several charities in India and the USA. Suma received PhD in Molecular Biology from University of Maryland and is a Director at the US Department of Veterans Affairs.

Arindam Ghosh is a filmmaker specializing in micro-budget films on Indian stories with a global theme. His first film, Shyamal Uncle Turns off the Lights, was world premiered at the Busan International Film Festival and in the US, it was premiered at the Museum of Modern Arts in NY and was also shown at the Smithsonian. It won the award of Outstanding International Feature at the Reelworld Film Festival. His second film, Peace Haven, won the prestigious Script Development Award from the Asian Cinema Fund and was on Netflix. More recently he has played one of the leads in Once Upon a Time in Calcutta, which was world premiered at the Venice International and has been shown at numerous festivals in the US including the DCSAFF, DCIFF, NYIFF and LAIFF winning numerous awards.  Arindam is also the co-Artistic Director of Ebong TheatriX, a theater group in the DC area, which he co-founded in 2014. He has been performing since he was eight with his formal training in theater from Jadavpur University, India. He continued his interest in theater after immigrating to the U.S. and has been an active member of the South Asian theater community in the US for the last twenty years. He has written, directed, and acted in more than fifty productions and has performed at numerous theater festivals all over the US and in India including the Nandikar National Theater festival. His most recent production, Five Grains of Rice, which he wrote and co-directed has won critical acclaim and has been shown at various festivals including the Silver Spring One Act festival.

Mansoor Ahmed, Mansoor Ahmed (Moonie), DCSAFFs Technical Director, retired as the Division Director for Astrophysics at NASA, Goddard Space Flight Center. During the day he studies the stars and in the evening he shoots them. Moonie made his directorial debut in 2013 with the critically acclaimed film, Bhool. His passion for filmmaking can be traced back to his childhood days in Peshawar, Pakistan, where he lived across from the only English language cinema hall in the city – it wasn’t long before he became mesmerized by the world of international cinema.

Shirish Nene, Shirish Néné has served on the jury of the DC South Asian Film Festival every year since 2016, and can regularly be seen at this and other film festivals in the larger metropolitan area. A brief training period with noted Indian dramatist Badal Sircar, started a love for the visual and auditory story telling arts spanning almost forty years, and expanded from the stage to large and small screens. This passion is a family affair today, finding expression in audition workshops with his daughter an LA based actress, and film-making with a son training to be a film director in Virginia. Most recently he and his wife have joined DC Storytellers a dedicated band of moviemakers in the DC metro area.