Union Minister of State for Information & Broadcasting L. Murugan inaugurated the India pavilion at Cannes’ Marché du Film on Wednesday.
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Addressing a gathering, Mr. Murugan said today India was the world’s largest producer of films with over 3,000 films in more than 50 languages. “These films carry a message of India’s strength in storytelling across the world,” he said. Citing the example of the now famed “Elephant Whisperers” of Mudumalai, the Minister said: “we are witnessing an era where Indian content is going local to global.”
The Minister said the Indian media and entertainment sector was poised for an extraordinary growth rate of 11.4% in 2023, propelling its revenue to a staggering ₹2.36 trillion. “This remarkable surge is a testament to the robustness of India’s M&E industry and its potential to create novel opportunities, even in a rapidly evolving digital landscape,” he said.
Mr. Murugan said after the COVID-19 pandemic, the gross box office revenues of 2022 in India, had increased almost three times that of 2021 to $1.3 billion and expected to touch $3 billion by 2025. He pitched India as an attractive movie destination for foreign films and said the government was committed to developing India as “a magnet for international movie industry” in the areas of shooting, co-production, animation and low cost post-production.