It's like bringing the magic of the silver screen, the world of Indian films into your home. With just a click of the mouse, you can watch Bharat Bhushan mouthing memorable songs from Baiju Bawra, view Lata Mangeshkar enacting a film role, get revolted by Amjad Khan doing his Gabbar act, feel the romance of Anil Kapoor and Manisha Koirala's rain number in 1942, A Love Story . Here's your chance to relieve innumerable memorable moments from the 60 years of Hindi cinema.

All this comes to you through the most ambitious CD-ROM title ever produced in the country, 'Indian Cinema - A Treasure'. This multimedia title has information on Hindi cinema and the people connected with it since the advent of the talkie in India in 1931.

'Indian Cinema', besides being intuitive is also entertaining with virtual sets, virtual cinema halls and a virtual archive. It lists more than 13,000 individuals - both artists and crew members -- linked with showbiz. It contains a list of more than 8200 Hindi films made since 1931, with 600 all-time hits represented either in stills, video clips or music. With 36 video clips, 100 songs, 850 stills and portraits and synopses of more than 2300 movies, it really is a large pool on information available to you at the click of mouse. For instance, there are 46 categories for various genres, from costume films to musical murder mysteries.

The CD-ROM has screens akin to a movie set background giving it a 3-D effect where one seems to take a stroll in the virtual movie world. All the video clips are in full screen and full frames and hence add to the clarity of the picture.

'Indian Cinema' has a particularly amazing search engine with nine different parameters performing synchronously; it can separate out any specific movie or person out of an exhausting list of around 13,000 people and 8,200 movies.

To add spice to the programme, there are funny one-liner called "Today's Special" related to the tinsel world that flash at the top of the screen intermittently. This keeps the contents of the CD-ROM fresh at all times.

There are also three interesting games related to cinema- ' Milan ', 'Snakes and Ladders' and 'Antakshari'. There's also some personal information about your favourite stars including their places of birth, zodiac signs, birthdays, addresses and contact numbers.

Another fascinating feature of the CD-ROM is "My Diary", an option which allows you to write and save specific information for future reference.

This CD-ROM was launched and released on 11 th Jan 1999 by Shri Pramod Mahajan, Union Minister for Information and Broadcasting and was presented to the Honourable Chief Minister of Andhra Pradesh, Shri Chandrababu Garu Naidu, at the International Film Festival of India, Hyderabad, in the present of the international press and delegates.