Eminent Indian-origin filmmaker Pan Nalin's documentary Faith Connections has been sold to France and Switzerland ahead of its world premiere at the Toronto International Film Festival.

SDD (Sophie Dulac Distribution) has acquired French rights to the India-French co-production, filmed at India's Kumbh Mela, while the Swiss rights went to Filmcoopi. Advanced negotiations are also underway for sales to Canada, the US, Germany and India.

The film is being sold by Raphael Berdugo's Cite Films, which is also co-produced with Nalin and Gaurav Dhingra's Jungle Book Entertainment. Berdugo, Dhingra, Nalin and Virginie Lacombe are credited as producers.

Faith Connections follows the stories of holy men, policemen, pilgrims and a runaway child at India's biggest religious festival, which is held once every 12 years and attracts around 100 million Hindu pilgrims.

Nalin has previously directed feature documentary Ayurveda: Art of Being and narrative features Samsara and The Valley of Flowers.

"We decided to co-produce and take on the sales of this film because we trust the talent of director Pan Nalin to tell us deeply moving human stories which can appeal to the world," said Berdugo.

"My experience of international sales when I was in charge of Roissy Films was that the common language of the world is emotion and people are eager to be moved while discovering other cultures."

"Ayurveda: Art of Being and Samsara were huge successes in Switzerland - both were based on the vast interest of our audience in spirituality and a quest of wellbeing of humanity. Pan Nalin's new film follows these themes and we are sure that it will be successful too," said Filmcoopi's Felix Hachler.

"A garland of magnificent images captured by Pan Nalin; truly exceptional characters with simple but astonishing stories; and an incredible happening which only occurs once in twelve years encouraged us to bring this extraordinary documentary to the French public," said Dulac.