One of India's leading directors has finalised plans for a Hindi feature film that is being projected as a sub-continental Schindler's List, which he hopes will be a cultural contribution to thawing relations between India and Pakistan.
Award-winning Bollywood director Mahesh Bhatt's film tells the story of a Pakistani policeman who stopped a Muslim mob from killing 200 Hindus during the 1947 partition riots.
It will be shot entirely in Pakistan - another first for a Hindi film - and is being produced by London-based Pakistani tycoon Sevi Ali.
Since partition in 1947, predominantly Hindu India and Muslim Pakistan have fought three fully fledged wars, leaving relations between them embittered. International mediation diffused a nuclear standoff in 2001 after a terrorist attack on India's parliament that India claimed was orchestrated by Pakistan.
Taking a cue from politicians, Bollywood films have traditionally typecast Pakistanis as killers and rapists, poisoning the minds of millions of ordinary Indians through movies.
Since Prime Minister Atal Behari Vajpayee's Hindu nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party came to power in India, Pakistani generals and intelligence officers have increasingly been cast as villains in Hindi films.