Channel 4 brings together the very best film, drama, features and factual programming in early 2010 in a season that celebrates India, exploring its rich culture, culinary traditions and the human stories that shape one of the world's most diverse and captivating countries. The season kicks off with the UK TV Network premiere of Film4's Slumdog Millionaire. The Oscar-laden film tells the story of how a Mumbai orphan ends up on Who Wants to Be a Millionaire?

Gordon Ramsay travels to India for the first time to experience the staggering diversity of its cuisine in Gordon's Great Escape. His epic journey showcases India's stunning scenery, diverse people and an abundance of delicious, mouth-watering food that puts British take-away curries in the shade. In Kevin McCloud: Slumming It, Kevin McCloud travels to Mumbai to explore the city's architecture and the way it shapes everyday life in this bustling metropolis.

Award-winning series The Secret Millionaire returns with a special one-off episode, Slumdog Secret Millionaire Special (working title), in which a British Indian female entrepreneur leaves behind her affluent lifestyle in the UK to go incognito in India, where an estimated 250 million people live in poverty. Living on a budget, the Secret Millionaire forges her own way in the metropolitan city of Mumbai. Dispatches Special: The Slumdog Children of Mumbai reveals the brutal reality of life on the streets and in the slums of Mumbai, following the daily struggles of four young children to survive.

A season of Indian cinema includes an all-night tribute to the Oscar-winning Slumdog Millionaire composer AR Rahman, featuring screenings of Rang De Basanti and Jodhaa Akbar. Also showing is Bollywood blockbuster Om Shanti Om, starring Shah Rukh Khan, and featuring cameos from the biggest stars of contemporary Indian Cinema.

Wednesday 13 January 2010
Screening of Slumdog Millionaire:

An orphaned Mumbai slum kid tries to change his life by winning TV's 'Who Wants To Be A Millionaire?' in Danny Boyle's multi-Oscar-winning fable. Jamal Malik ('Skins' star Dev Patel) is being beaten by Mumbai police for allegedly cheating on hit TV show 'Who Wants To Be A Millionaire?' One question away from the ultimate 20 million rupee prize, no one, including slick show host Prem (Anil Kapoor), believes a chai wallah (teaboy) like Jamal could know all the answers. As the tough inspector (Irfan Khan) replays Jamal's appearance on the show, it's revealed that each question corresponds to a specific life lesson from Jamal's tragic past.

Raised in abject poverty in Mumbai's grimmest slum along with older brother Salim, then orphaned by a Hindu mob attack, Jamal and Salim are forced to fend for themselves on the streets through opportunistic petty crime. They pick up a young girl, fellow orphan Latika (Freida Pinto), escape the clutches of a vicious Fagin-like crime boss, lose Latika, and continue their picaresque adventures, one step ahead of the law. As adolescents, however, Salim becomes entranced by a life of crime and Latika's unexpected return sets brother against brother. Will Jamal salvage his girl, his fortune and his life on 'Millionaire'?

Thursday 14th January 2010
Slumming It:
Kevin McCloud travels to Mumbai to explore one of the biggest slums in Asia and spends time living among its one million residents.

Sunday 17th January 2010
Slumdog Secret Millionaire:
Secret Millionaire returns with a special episode, in which a British Indian female entrepreneur goes incognito in India.

Wednesday 20 January 2010
Gordon's Great Escape:
Gordon Ramsay travels to India for the first time to experience the staggering diversity of its cuisine.

Sunday 24 January 2010
The Slumdog Children of Mumbai:
Dispatches investigates the brutal reality of life on the streets for the real slumdog kids in the slums of Mumbai.

A few weeks after running away from his abusive stepmother, 11-year-old Salam is living rough outside the main train station. Befriended by a gang of begging boys, run by 20-year-old Asif, Salam speaks fondly of his new 'brother'. But it soon appears that there is a much darker side to being in Asif's gang.

Deepa (pictured) is lucky to be alive after rats attacked her when she was just three months old. Now aged seven, she runs barefoot through the hectic Mumbai traffic to sell flowers to help support her family, doing shifts of up to 20 hours at a time. She lives with her grandmother and brothers in a slum with no electricity or sanitation, next to an open rubbish dump. They survive on less than £1 day since her alcoholic father died two years earlier and her mother abandoned them.

Twins Hussain and Hussan, aged 11, live in a shanty town, balanced precariously on a 10-foot-wide water pipe. Five days a week they collect scrap metal and plastic bottles to sell so they can earn money to eat. They also fish utensils out of the canal that runs alongside their back door to sell, despite the risk of cholera and infection. They say they like where they live; 'We are emperors of the night!' jokes Hussan. But they don't want to think about their futures.

Dispatches provides a deeply moving portrait of the lives of India's real slumdogs, blighted by substance abuse, hardship and heartache, yet proof of the infinite resilience of children, and forced to reach adulthood long before they should.

Monday 25 January 2010
Indian Cinema: Screening of 'Om Shanti Om'

Om Shanti Om addresses the concept of reincarnation and in doing so, honours the 1970s and Subhash Ghai's celebrated Karz

As the initial reels of Om Shanti Om unwind, we are introduced to Om (Khan) who is desperate to make it as a heroic leading actor while working as a junior artist in the beehived, flared 1970s. It's "dreamy girl" Shanti (Padukone) who forms the root of Om's infatuation but alas his love is unrequited by the A-list actress; until he saves her from the burning sets of a film shoot in true hero style so forming a bond between the two.

Shanti is secretly married to Mukesh (Rampal) a seedy film producer who wants to keep their union a secret until the completion of their new film, much to the reluctance of a pregnant Shanti who demands a respectable place in society as his beau.

Upon realising that Shanti won't keep quiet, Mukesh kills her, unaware of the fact that Om has witnessed the whole incident. Once again, as the valiant knight in shining armour, Om tries to save Shanti but the two die - only for Om to be reincarnated as a top film starlet's son, Om Kapoor.

With an unexplainable phobia of fire and reoccurring flashbacks, Om finds it hard to decipher the state of his mind until the revelation of his previous life comes to the forefront. The rest of the film deals with how Om Kapoor sets out to get justice for Shanti and himself with the help of a Shanti look-alike, who may not be what she seems.

Tuesday 26th January 2010
News from India:
Krishnan Guru-Murthy reports from the heart of India, seeking out the human stories in this beautiful and extraordinary country.