A celebration called Mumbai Festival

Get set to celebrate this unique experience called Mumbai.

Come January 14, the Mumbai Festival will burst on the cityscape with a grand mix of dance, drama, music, art, culture, food, and films and will last till January 23.

This first ever private-public enterprise of its kind aims to place Mumbai on the world map as a leading cultural destination.

The festival will be inaugurated by Maharashtra chief minister Vilasrao Deshmukh and Union Minister of State for Tourism, Renuka Choudhury.

The people behind the fest

The Mumbai Festival committee is made up of some of Mumbai's most well-known celebrities.

Spearheaded by Mahindra & Mahindra head honcho Anand Mahindra, the committee also has MTV's Alex Kuruvilla, Ashwini Kakkar of Thomas Cook, Jabbar Patel of the P L Deshpande Academy, former sheriffs of Mumbai Kiran Shantaram and Nana Chudasama; Peter Mukherjea of Star India, ad film maker Prahlad Kakkar, Sanjay Ubale (secretary, special projects, Mumbai Task Force), food expert Rashmi Uday Singh, art connoisseur Sangeeta Jindal, Nikhil Meswani of Reliance Industries, Siddharth Kak of Surabhi Foundation, and a host of others.

Events Big and Small: The complete list

Though major events are planned at the Gateway of India, Marine Drive and Bandra Reclamation, there are several smaller events which will be held all over the city, especially at colleges and shopping outlets.

The effort is to enable participation by all those who make the city what it is.

The event has been conceptualised and organised by the Tourism Cooperative with 'Vasudaiva Kutumbakam' (literally, world is one family) as its core philosophy.

Earlier this programme was scheduled on January 7, but postponed because of tsunami tragedy.

Creative citizens have been roped in to manage each module autonomously. So they take care of the ads and the sponsorships for each respective section.

Rashmi Uday Singh, for instance, is in charge of food, Sangita Jindal will handle arts, and Siddharth Kak the crafts section.

Each of them has committed to locate sponsors for their segments, and going by reports they have been successful.

There are also parallel programmes that have agreed to co-brand their events with the Mumbai Festival, such as the Mumbai International Marathon. More initiatives will reveal as the event unfolds, the organisers have said.