This year's Netflix global top 10 list includes Gangubai Kathiawadi, RRR, and Bhool Bhulaiyaa 2

Monika Shergill, Netflix India's Vice-President (Content), stated that seven Indian titles have appeared on Netflix's global top ten lists this year. According to Variety, viewership of Indian films on the streaming service has increased by 50% since last year.

Hits for the service include Alia Bhatt's Gangubai Kathiyawadi, pan-India blockbuster RRR and Bhool Bhulaiyaa 2, featuring Kartik Aaryan and Tabu.

She pointed out that, until recently, the "majority of content" on Netflix India was in Hindi and English. However, over the last 18 months, the service has licensed titles in southern Indian languages and broadcasted original content in Tamil, Telugu, Malayalam, Marathi, and Bengali.

Another successful Alia film was Darlings, a story about domestic abuse that debuted as the service's biggest non-English language original film opener worldwide. Shefali Shah and Vijay Verma gave strong performances in the film, which Alia co-produced with Red Chillies Entertainment.

"We believed in these filmmakers' vision," Shergill spoke of Rajamouli and Bhansali.

She went on to add, that Gangubai Kathiawadi was such a disruptive and edgy story about a sex worker in the red light district that it would have made a large portion of Indian audiences uncomfortable to watch—but Sanjay's craft and vision for the film were something they wanted to collaborate on. "Similarly, Rajamouli's vision is so distinct and he thinks on such a grand scale that combining these two genres of history and fantasy was so appealing to us."

Malayalam language Minnal Murali, a Kerala-set superhero movie starring Tovino Thomas, and anthologies Paava Kadhaigal and Navarasa in Tamil, Pitta Kathalu in Telugu, and The Disciple in Marathi have equally been luring in local and global audiences.

Shergill added, "Titles are vying for release windows, and as a result, many big-ticket films are competing at the box office. Because many of these big, theatrical titles come to platforms and are then available to audiences in India and globally, streaming has revolutionised the theatrical cinema space in India."

To summarise her final thoughts, Shergill stated that exposure to global content via streaming has dramatically broadened India's audiences' tastes.

"Since the pandemic, we've seen an increase in people experimenting with content in different languages, such as Korean and Spanish. This is the time to tell truly great stories that will cross borders and bring cultures together."