India is announcing its arrival as the world's newest animation hub with the release of the country's first, and what seems to be the world's largest, classic animated film.

"Bhaggmati - The Queen of Fortunes", to be released all across the country Friday, is a 2D animation film that also has living characters.

While the live part of the film - produced by Zee Telefilms - represents the present, animated characters have been used to portray the historical era.

"The film is the world's largest classic animated film made by Indians in India for the world," said Ashish Kaul, vice president (brand development) of Essel Group that owns Zee Telefilms.

"The total duration of the film is two hours and 40 minutes. The animated portion of the film is of one hour and 35 minutes duration, which is the longest in the world till date," Kaul told IANS.

"The film is more of a business presentation to the world where we have used celluloid screen instead of power point presentation to highlight India's rapid strides in the field of animation."

"Bhaggmati - The Queen of Fortunes" is the legend of the famed love story of prince Mohammed Qutab Quli Shah and the beautiful dancer Bhaggmati.

The fourth Qutab Shahi ruler is believed to have built the city of Hyderabad at the behest of his ladylove. Milind Soman and Tabu play the lead roles while Hema Malini makes a special appearance in a classical dance performance.

Produced with an investment of Rs.80 million ($1.84 million), the film has over 750,000 hand-drawn frames for the animation portions. Zee Institute of Creative Arts (ZICA), an Essel Group arm, has done all the animation work for the film.

"The actual work on the film started some four years back. We wanted it to be a completely Indian work and therefore we had to first train some 100 animators before involving them in the film production work," said Kaul.

"We managed to complete the film on a small budget of Rs.80 million. The same film would have cost Rs.6 billion in the West due to significantly higher labor and other related costs there," he added.

Although India, Asia's fourth-largest economy, is a recent entrant in the global animation scene, demand for its production services is growing at a fast pace with customers in the US, Britain and Canada.

According to an animation industry study report, Indian animation production costs are the lowest, as compared to production rates in the US, Canada, South Korea and the Philippines - the major global centres for animation production.

While the rates for production of a half-hour television animation programme is around $250,000-$400,000 in the US and Canada, it is in the region of $60,000 in India, says the National Association of Software and Service Companies.

Kaul said "Bhaggmati - The Queen of Fortunes" would be launched in the international market in the second week of September. "The film will be dubbed in all major European languages so that the people there can relate to it."

The film is written and directed by National Award winner Ashok Kaul. Vishal Bhardwaj has composed the music and Asha Bhonsle, Sadhna Sargam, Suresh Wadekar and Roop Kumar Rathod have sung the compositions.

The Essel Group official said the company hoped to bag international rights for animation film production following the successful launch of "Bhaggmati - The Queen of Fortunes" in the domestic as well as international markets.