Bollywood's Jackie Shroff to celebrate 100 years of Indian cinema in Bradford

The Bollywood actor Jackie Shroff will be visiting Bradford on Friday to celebrate 100 years to the day since the release of India's first feature film, Raja Harishchandra.

Jackie Shroff, who this year celebrates 30 years since the release of his own breakthrough film Hero (Subhash Ghai, 1983), will visit the National Media Museum, where the film is being screened.

The critically acclaimed actor, who has starred in around 150 films, will also meet the Lord Mayor of Bradford as well as students from Bradford College. On Saturday, he will record a special 'In conversation' event before a live audience hosted by the BBC Asian Network at the Pictureville cinema.

Raja Harishchandra was produced and directed by Dhundiraj Govind Phalke, better known as Dadasaheb Phalke. The 40-minute film had its first public screening at the Coronation Theatre in Mumbai on 3 May 1913. The story was adapted from Hindu mythology and, much like Shakespearean England, the female characters were played by male actors.

Phalke made more films and acted as his own distributor, by loading his reels, projector and screen in a bullock cart and travelling from place to place to show his films.

One hundred years on, it is estimated that 3bn cinema tickets are sold in India every year – twice as many as the US. Britain has played its own part in Bollywood's phenomenal global success. It is now the fastest growing non-English cinema in Britain with more Indian films being shot on our shores. Since the runaway success of Dilwale Dulhania Le Jayenge (Aditya Chopra, 1995) – which was the longest running film in the history of Indian cinema — more storylines feature diasporic characters living in cities like London, Sydney and New York.

Takings for Bollywood films in Britain have only been officially recorded since 1998, when Mani Ratnam's Dil Se became the first Bollywood film to enter the UK box office top ten. These days, Britain is one of the most important markets for Bollywood films, contributing more than a third of the revenue, when combined with the US and the Middle East territories.

Bradford, the world's first Unesco City of Film, has a longstanding relationship with Bollywood too. Indian films have been screened in the city since the 1950s, thanks to the entrepreneurship of migrant mill and foundry workers from India and Pakistan.

More recently, the National Media Museum has played host to the biggest stars of the industry, including Amitabh Bachchan and Shahrukh Khan. This autumn sees the official opening of the new Whistling Woods International Bradford College Film School, which will provide undergraduate courses in filmmaking and animation. Students will also have the opportunity to study at the Whistling Woods campus in Mumbai to experience the Indian film industry first hand.

Whistling Woods International – Asia's premier film, television, animation and media arts institute — has been rated amongst the 10 best film schools in the world by the Hollywood Reporter.

Jackie Shroff will be particularly interested in the Whistling Woods initiative since the man behind it, film-maker Subhash Ghai, was responsible for launching his career three decades ago. Subhash Ghai directed Hero, Shroff's second film, which catapulted the 53-year-old to fame. It was also at the director's suggestion that Jai Kishen Shroff took the screen name Jackie.

His successful association with Subhash Ghai continued with films such as Khalnayak (1989), Ram Lakhan (1993) and Yaadein (2001), which was partly shot in Britain.