Raja Harishchandra was released on April 21, 1913 for a select audience at the Olympia Theatre in Mumbai. It was later released commercially on May 3, 1913. It means  the Indian feature films have entered their 100th year in April, 2012. Dada Saheb Phalke was the first Indian to make a feature film. Prior to the release of Raja Harishchandra, Torane’s film Pundalik was released on 18th May, 1912 at the Coronation Theatre.However, film historians take Raja  Harishchandra as the first Indian film because Pundalik was photographed from a play.There is no evidence of an independent script, shot division at different places and editing. The makers also employed a British cinematographer. Raja Harishchandra, as Phalke himself put it, was fully swadeshi.

Raja Harishchandra was a mythological based on the popular legend of the righteous king Harishchandra. Phalke followed it up by other mythologicals, Lanka Dahan (1917), Shri Krishna Janma (1918) and Kaliya Mardan (1919).Raja Harishchandra was a 40-minute film.