New Delhi: The 66th National Film Awards ceremony took place in Vigyan Bhawan today, and Vice President Venkaiah Naidu handed over the awards to the winners.
Amitabh Bachchan was awarded the Dadasaheb Phalke Award, however, he could not attend the ceremony. VP Naidu paid him tribute in his speech, calling Mr Bachchan “an institution by himself”.
Prakash Javadekar, Minister for Information and Broadcasting, noted the popularity of Indian films abroad, particularly China. He also made special mentions of some of the awardees, including Best Actors Ayushmann Khurrana and Vicky Kaushal, Best Actress Keerthy Suresh, and Akshay Kumar, whose movie PadMan won the award for Best Film on Social Issues.
Best Music Direction was awarded to Sanjay Leela Bhansali for “Padmaavat” and Shashwat Sachdev for Uri: The Surgical Strike. Best Director Aditya Dhar won an award for Uri.
Best Feature Film was awarded to Gujarati film ‘Hellaro’.
Special Mention awards were awarded to Sruthi Hariharan (Nathicharami), Chandrachud Rai, Joju George (Joseph), Savithri Sreedharan (Sudani From Nigeria).
‘Sudani from Nigeria’ awarded the Best Malayalam Film.
