Salman Khan, Priyanka Chopra at Dubai awards !

It's going to be a celebration of Bollywood's brightest stars at the inaugural Arab Indo Bollywood Awards 2015 next month with a "gold carpet" roll call that includes big names such as Salman Khan, Priyanka Chopra, Varun Dhawan, Parineeti Chopra and Jacqueline Fernandez.

AIBA 2015 is a three-day Bollywood event with the awards presentation ceremony on April 9 at Meydan Racecourse.

Producer-director Karan Johar and comedian Manish Paul will take on hosting duties and honour the best in the fields of acting, direction, music and choreography.

"I agree that there are many Bollywood awards in India that people watch on TV, but it's the first time that we are bringing such a big Bollywood awards ceremony into the Middle East. This region is one of the biggest markets for Bollywood films and our hope is that the interest for our films increases after AIBA," said director and head of AIBA 2015 jury Tigmanshu Dhulia in an interview with tabloid! on Monday. The National-award winning director, whose credits include Paan Singh Tomar, said his panel arrived at the nominations after sifting through 230 Bollywood films.

"Out of those films, there were at least 15 to 20 good films. Our task was to narrow that down further. Our best film category has films that captured the public imagination. It isn't only about blockbusters but good, entertaining cinema," said Dhulia. The jury panel includes a mix of directors such as Arbaaz Khan and Anees Bazmee, as well as producers, distributors and writers.

Incidentally, a good chunk of the actors who are confirmed to attend also feature in the nominations list. While Khan has been nominated for his role in the 2014 blockbuster Kick, the Chopra cousins have been given a nod for boxer biopic Mary Kom (Priyanka) and romantic comedy Hasee Toh Phasee (Parineeti).
"We have validated every category/entrant after thorough scrutiny and through mutual consent we have arrived at the final nomination list. I would like thank the UAE government for giving AIBA the platform to showcase our talents and bringing us closer to the millions of fans that reside in the UAE and GCC. We are exhilarated and it is definitely going to be an emotional moment for all of us," said director and producer Arbaaz Khan, who's a part of the eight- member AIBA jury. Arbaaz is also Salman Khan's younger brother.
The winners will be chosen through public voting and by the jury.

"It's going to be a 50-50 process. While some of the technical categories will be judged solely by the jury, categories such as Best Actor, Best Actress and Best Director will open to the public for voting," said Dhulia.

Other events around AIBA 2015 include a roadshow on April 8, during which some of the Bollywood stars will go around malls to interact with their fans and talk up AIBA and an after- party on April 10. The details of these events are yet to be confirmed.

"The AIBA Award night will be a moment of truth; bringing the reel world to real life. The performances, lighting backdrops, fireworks will be spectacular and [AIBA] will be an event that will showcase the best in the industry," said Habeeb Rahman, managing director of Benchmark, one of the organisers of the event, in a release on Monday.