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Hollywood here we come, says Indian delegation

Can Bollywood go global?

A delegation of Indian film, television and music industry people is in the United States this week to persuade American industry and investors.

The delegation, headed by Information and Broadcasting Minister Sushma Swaraj, has so far visited major studios in Los Angeles and Motion Pictures Association of America president Jack Valenti in Washington with the message that India wants to be an international player in entertainment.

In that effort, New Delhi will be hoping to replicate the same phenomenal success it has enjoyed in global information technology, Indian business and government leaders said.

"In the trinity of ICE, that is, Infotech, Communication and Entertainment, the last two-three years, especially in India, have seen considerable focus on Information Technology and Communication," Swaraj said at the two-day US-India Business Council conference in the US capital that ended on Wednesday.

"However the entertainment sector has an equally vast potential," she said.

India, and the Bombay movie industry popularly known as Bollywood, produces some 800 films per year compared with the United States' 100, making it the largest film-producing country in the world in numbers of films.

But its market share is $3.5 billion in a global $300 billion industry and there are just 12 theatres per million people compared with 116 screens per million Americans, industry executives said, indicating room for growth both in global market share and in theater construction.

BIG ROADBLOCKS

Some who spoke at the conference were quick to point out serious roadblocks to India's aspirations, however.

Nishith Desai, founder of a legal and tax consulting firm that provided the conference with an interim report from a study on "Bollywood vs Hollywood," summed it up by saying what Hollywood has that Bollywood does not -- respect for legal agreements, standardisation and funding mechanisms.

"The lack of written contracts is probably one of the foremost reasons why Hollywood and Bollywood remain separated," said the interim report, the final version of which is due out by September. Most agreements are made verbally and even when written are short and often ambiguous, it said.

"Due to this informal practice, the players are often not conscious of their commitments and obligations," it said.

Global consultancy firm Arthur Andersen has said the Indian entertainment industry is poised for high growth if only its ride could be made smoother by a government that has long ignored it and even stunted the sector's growth by state control of the broadcast media.

India now allows 100 per cent foreign investment in films and television software and has formed a 45-member, multi-party standing committee to look at the politically-sensitive issue of allowing such investment in the print media, Swaraj said.

She maintained that Indian and US industry can create "synergies" in the entertainment sector just as they have in infotech, where Indian companies work on inputting data or customer service for US companies in the American night.

"We can think of collaborations and foreign direct investments. We can talk of co-productions. We can learn a lot from US expertise in technology and at the same time offer world-class trained personnel at very competitive costs," she said.

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