“I never thought I would win for Ishaqzaade but when I did, it was the biggest one in the country!! That too for my first lead role! I just cannot believe it. But this scares and humbles me, and will definitely make me work even harder in the future!! Thank you jury,” Parineeti said.
Director Kaushik Ganguly, whose film Shabdo won the best Bengali film award, said he is surprised that an unconventional film has got national recognition.
“The subject was unique but I am glad that the jury liked it. This is encouraging for us,” he said.
Director Sujoy Ghosh won the Best Original Screenplay National award for Kahaani and the Best Editing award went to Namrata Rao for the same film.
“I am very happy winning the award. It is a huge honour. I am still trying to absorb the news. The feeling is yet to sink in,” Sujoy told PTI.
Dolly Ahluwalia, who shared the Best Supporting Actress National award with Kalpana (Malayalam film ‘Thanichalla Njan’), said, “This is all thanks to my director and my audience for having faith and seeing me as Dolly Arora. For me, being happy is a small word, I am flying right now.”
The actress played the role of a spunky Punjabi mother who runs a beauty parlour in ‘Vicky Donor’.
“For me this is still a dream. The National Awards have a true meaning for me and I am blessed. This is my second National award, the first was for designing costumes for ‘Bandit Queen’,” she added.
Lyricist Prasoon Joshi is quite elated to have won a National award again, this time for the song ‘Bolo Na’ from Bedabrata Pain’s film ‘Chittagong’.
“It is a small but humble film. Also, this song was not promoted. It is an exceptionally great song and I am thankful to the jury for recognising it. Also, I have not charged anything for this song. I was moved by Bedabrata’s love for cinema,” Joshi told PTI.
‘Chittagong’ is directed by NASA scientist turned Bedabrata. The 2012 film starring Manoj Bajpayee, Barry John, Nawazuddin Siddiqui and Raj Kumar Yadav is based upon actual events of India’s Chittagong Uprising.
“Other film awards were not even bothered to give an award to this song. I had no clue this song would win, that too a national award. I am totally surprised for getting the award. I am much happy,” he said.
Now that the song has won an award, Joshi wants everyone to listen to it.
“I just want people to listen to it and understand why it has got a national award,” he said.
Joshi has earlier won a national award for penning the lyrics of ‘Meri Maa’, the song from Aamir Khan’s directorial debut ‘Taare Zameen Par’.
——PTI