Superstar Amitabh Bachchan says the popularity of India's prolific film industry could be boosted by hosting Bollywood's biggest award ceremony in Britain.

This year's International Indian Film Awards (IIFA) ceremony will be held in Sheffield in northern England on June 9.

"Yorkshire is beautiful and has a very large Asian community," Bachchan was quoted as saying by a newspaper.

"Such events always manage to propagate the coming together of different communities," Bachchan added.

The annual film awards were created seven years ago and are presented outside India to promote Indian films for an international audience.

Previous ceremonies have been held in the United Arab Emirates, the Netherlands, London and Singapore, to name a few places.

Bachchan marveled at how people who don't even speak Hindi talk to him about Indian movies when he is abroad.

"I've had non-Asians who don't even know our language coming up to me and saying they like a particular movie of mine," he said.

"Some don't even know my name, but know the characters I play. Such is the reach of Bollywood," the Brand Ambassador of IIFA Awards remarked.