The company was founded in Kolhapur in 1929 and moved to Pune 4 years later. The present-day FTII campus was initially a land bought by the Prabhat Film Company way back in the year 1933. The old Studios of Prabhat are now heritage structures and FTII students continue to work at the world's oldest functioning film shooting studios. The archaic studios of the time, which were the production grounds for the films of Prabhat are still present and are being used at FTII.
Prabhat Studio was a pioneer in the business of filmmaking and shifted to Pune from Kolhapur in 1933. The FTII Campus currently stands on the grounds of the erstwhile Prabhat Studio. The Film and Television Institute of India (FTII) was set up by the Government of India in 1960, in the premises of the erstwhile Prabhat Studios in Pune.