The Hindi film industry, popularly known as Bollywood, is one of the largest film production centers in the world. The first feature film produced in India was the Dadasaheb Phalke directed silent black-and-white film Raja Harishchandra, which was released in 1913.
Beginning with the 1940s, Bollywood films also saw major commercial success, and several box office milestones were breached. As the popularity of cinema spread, theatrical revenue kept increasing. The 1943 Gyan Mukherjee-directed ‘Kismet’ became the first Bollywood film to cross the INR 1 crore mark. Subsequently, more films breached the INR 10 million mark, until ‘Shree 420’ breached the INR 2 crore mark for the first time.
Beginning with the 1960s and particularly 1970s, Bollywood films achieved major commercial success more regularly, and the revenue earned multiplied manifold throughout this period (a trend that continued into the 1990s); Sholay (1975) earned triple the amountthat the previous record-holder Mughal-e-Azam (1960) earned, while Hum Aapke Hain Koun..! (1994) more than quadrupled Sholay's record. Post the "dark phase" of the 1980s, business increased tremendously as is visible from the major success of films like Hum Aapke Hain Koun..!, Dilwale Dulhaniya Le Jayenge and Gadar: Ek Prem Katha.
Since 2008, Bollywood films have started breaching the INR 100 crore mark consistently; Ghajini was the first Bollywood film to cross the mark. Considered a turning point in Bollywood, multiple films have breached that mark since then. Beginning with the 2000s (decade) and particularly 2010s, the release size and marketing efforts have increased rapidly to the extent that films can achieve the INR 100 crore mark in a single week, and the single-day full-capacity revenue can be INR30 crore.
This is a list of the highest-grossing Hindi films based on the world-wide box office.
Courtesy Wikipedia
