It was the classic Indian films of the 1950s such as Raj Kapoor’s Awara and Guru Dutt’s Kaagaz ke Phool, which he was introduced to by his grandfather, that made Shivendra Singh Dungarpur fall in love with cinema when he was a boy growing up in the 70s.
Today, Dungarpur, a filmmaker based in Mumbai, fears that India’s rich cinema heritage – those beautiful old movies and many other classics that have brought joy to him and millions of other people – are at risk of being lost forever if urgent steps are not taken to preserve and restore them.