It stars Shafiq Syed, Raghuvir Yadav, Anita Kanwar, Nana Patekar, Hansa Vithal and Chanda Sharma.

After being released worldwide on 6 October 1988, the film grossed an estimated $7.4 million at the overseas box office, against a production budget of only $450,000.

His angry mother has taken him to the nearby Apollo Circus and told him that he can only come home when he has earned 500 rupees to pay for the damage.

One of the thieves, Chillum, a drug pusher and addict, helps Krishna get a job at the Grant Road Tea Stall and becomes a mentor of sorts to him.

To make matters worse, he has a crush on a teenage girl named "Sola Saal" (meaning "sixteen years"), who has been recently sold to the brothel.

To get more money, Krishna and his pals rob an elderly Parsi man by breaking into his house in broad daylight.

She is saved by the timely intervention of Krishna who, in a fit of rage, kills Baba and attempts to run away with her, but they become separated in a parade honoring Ganesh.

From the beginning, they decided that real street children would play in the film since the combination of childhood and knowledge in their faces would be hard to find among professional child actors.

She said, "on the first day of shooting, I received the news that the child actor who played the character of Pixote was shot dead in the street.

After this incident, I was more determined to make Salaam Bombay!, and decided to share the film's dividends with street children if we could.

Dinaz Stafford, a child psychologist, found the children, worked with them and assisted in the acting workshop run by Barry John.

Gradually the stories of the city of Bombay, their parents, sex, trafficking, drug dealing, gangs and their profiteering were learned from them.

[10] After its release, director Nair with Dinaz Stafford established an organization called the Salaam Baalak Trust in 1989 to rehabilitate the children who appeared in the film.

[11] [5] The Salaam Baalak Trust now lends support to street children in Bombay, Delhi and Bhubaneshwar.

Also in a scene at the movie theatre, Sridevi's dance to the song "Hawa Hawaii" sung by Kavita Krishnamurti from the 1987 film Mr. India is performed.

Following year, the film was released on 13 January in Denmark, 2 February in Netherlands, on 10 February in Finland, on 27 April in West Germany, on 29 June in Australia, on 27 July in Argentina, on 24 September at the Cinefest Sudbury International Film Festival in Canada and 3 November in Sweden.

Although the two films obviously have much in common, the children of Pixote exist in an anarchic and savage world, while those in "Salaam Bombay!"

examines life in a part of the world that many viewers have never visited - but does so with enough compassion and grace to make them feel as if they have.

"[32] English writer Hilary Mantel commented, "A warm and lively film, made by Mira Nair with only a handful of professional actors.

"[34] Ted Shen of Chicago Reader wrote that, "like Hector Babenco's Pixote the film is unsparingly gritty, but with a woman's tenderness it also grants the characters an occasional moment of grace.

"[36] American film critic Dave Kehr stated, "Much to Nair`s credit, she exploits neither the exoticism of her locale (there are no tour-guide, look-at-this flourishes) nor the misery of her subjects (suffer they may, but they do not demand pity).

[39] Emanuel Levy, thought that the film "drew its intensity and colour from its locale, the slums of Bombay.

"[15] Christopher Null wrote, "with Salaam, Nair proves an early ability with a camera and at getting performances out of obviously inexperienced actors, but her writing talents are much sketchier.

"[41] Rita Kempley of The Washington Post wrote, "Nair's film has been compared to Hector Babenco's chilling "Pixote," a Brazilian look at a 10-year-old street criminal, but hers is a more compassionate, though equally troubling, portrait.