Sharmila Tagore on Cannes jury

Indian actress Sharmila Tagore has been named as one of the members of the international jury of the Cannes Film Festival.

Tagore follows India's Arundhati Roy, Aishwarya Rai and Nandita Das, who served on the Cannes jury in recent years, perhaps making up for the country's no-show in the Festival's official sections since 2002.

This year's festival jury will be headed by French actress, Isabelle Huppert. The other members of the jury are Asia Argento (Italy), Nuri Bilge Ceylan (Turkey), Lee Chang-Dong (South Korea), James Gray (US), Hanif Kureishi (UK), Shu Qi (Taiwan) and Robin Wright Penn (US).

Tagore, 52, who currently heads the Central Board of Film Certification is the grand-daughter of poet Rabindranath Tagore.

She came into public limelight in 1959 when Satyajit Ray cast her as Apu's ill fated bride in Apur Sansar (The World of Apu) while she was still a teenager.

However, it was in commercial cinema that Tagore found her stardom in the 1960s, when movies such as Kashmir Ki Kali, Waqt, Anupama, An Evening in Paris and Aradhana got the box-office ringing.

Tagore was the first Indian actress to appear in a bikini on-screen in An Evening in Paris which was considered a daring move in the industry at that time.

Tagore's children Saif Ali Khan and Soha Ali Khan have taken forward her legacy and are leading names in Bollywood.

The Cannes Film Festival is from May 13 to 24.