Western Australia’s new film council is seeking to connect its diverse production landscape with Mumbai’s powerful cinematic ecosystem, creating new opportunities for collaboration.
At first glance, Perth and Mumbai may seem to inhabit very different cinematic worlds. One is a coastal city on the Indian Ocean, known for its open spaces and proximity to some of Australia’s most striking landscapes. The other is the nerve centre of India’s Hindi film industry, where stories, stars and production teams move at a relentless pace. Yet a new initiative is asking filmmakers to consider what these two cities, and the creative communities around them, might accomplish together.
The West Australian Indian Film Council (WAIFC), founded and chaired by Indian-Australian entrepreneur Nilesh Makwana, was formally launched at Government House in Perth on 11 September 2026. Within a week, its India-facing ambitions were visible in Mumbai, where Makwana took part in activities surrounding the opening of the University of Western Australia’s campus on 18 September.
The sequence was telling. WAIFC is seeking to build relationships that reach beyond individual film productions, bringing universities, screen professionals, businesses and cultural organisations into the same conversation. In Mumbai, the council’s presence coincided with an education milestone attended by Maharashtra Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis, Western Australian Premier Roger Cook, UWA Chancellor Diane Smith-Gander and Vice Chancellor Professor Amit Chakma.
For Indian filmmakers, however, the most immediate question is practical: what can Western Australia offer a production?
The answer begins with visual range. Perth’s urban and coastal settings are only one part of the picture. Across the state are vineyards, forests, historic towns, beaches and vast outback landscapes. Such variety could serve filmmakers working across genres, from intimate dramas and romances to action films and expansive travel stories. The location must, of course, answer the needs of the script. But Western Australia gives a director and cinematographer many distinct settings to consider within a single state.
There is also new infrastructure to support that creative appeal. Perth Film Studios has four soundstages, alongside production offices, workshops and a backlot. For an Indian team considering an overseas shoot, the possibility of combining studio work with location filming could make early discussions more concrete.
Screenwest, the state’s screen agency, provides location assistance and has published a production attraction incentive for eligible projects. The terms of any support would need to be assessed against a particular production.
Even the time difference works in favour of a conversation. Perth is two-and-a-half hours ahead of India, leaving substantial overlap in the working day. Producers in Mumbai can speak with a Perth-based team without either side having to organise its entire schedule around an inconvenient hour. It is a modest advantage, perhaps, but international productions are built through countless such exchanges.
WAIFC’s proposed role is to help turn interest into introductions. Its network includes the University of Western Australia, Edith Cowan University and Murdoch University, as well as screen businesses and other institutional supporters. In June, the council and UWA convened a Western Australia–India screen-industry roundtable in Perth. That gathering offered an early example of the council bringing people from the two screen communities into contact.
The Government House launch gave the initiative a larger public platform. Premier Cook, Western Australia’s Creative Industries Minister Simone McGurk and Consul General Biswas were among those present. Biswas called WAIFC Makwana’s “brainchild”, a brief description that also points to the persistence required to bring such a network together. A council can open doors, but lasting collaborations will depend on the projects and relationships that develop after the ceremonies are over.
WAIFC has assembled an International Advisory Council chaired by Jamshed Keki Mistry, whose legal work includes media and entertainment matters. Its international advisers include Gayathiri Guliani, with experience in content distribution and market development, and Rishabh Chopra, identified by the council as part of the leadership team at Yash Raj Films. Together, their fields of experience speak to different stages of a film’s journey: forming a partnership, making the work and finding its audience.
The council has also drawn on a much older connection between Western Australia and Indian cinema. Mary Evans, better known to generations of filmgoers as Fearless Nadia, was born in Perth in 1908. She went on to become one of the most recognisable action stars of Indian cinema, a performer whose screen presence still feels startlingly modern.
Choreographer Shiamak Davar, WAIFC’s Founding Cultural Connect Ambassador, has a family connection to Nadia through the Wadia family. Her story gives this emerging partnership a historical resonance: the traffic in talent and imagination between the two places began long before anyone thought to establish a film council.
Makwana’s own experience lies in connecting people across sectors. He co-founded illuminance Solutions and Borderless Gandhi and founded West Tech Assemblage. WAIFC now brings that relationshipbuilding approach into the screen world, supported by practitioners and advisers with more specialised industry knowledge.
None of this means a film is assured simply because the landscape is beautiful or a network has been established. But its September appearances in Perth and Mumbai have made the invitation visible on both sides of the Indian Ocean. The measure of the council’s success will come later, when a filmmaker finds a collaborator, a student gains industry experience, or a story discovers that its natural home lies somewhere neither side had initially imagined.
*Murtaza Ali Khan is an award-winning cultural critic, journalist, and academic. A jury member for the 69th & 70th National Film Awards, he has covered entertainment for The Hindu, The Sunday Guardian, and The Quint since 2008, with over 2,000 TV appearances as a media expert. He is also a film festival curator, translator of Hindujas and Bollywood, and a NET qualified journalism educator.
