National Award for 3 Idiots, Big B

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Bollywood marked its stamp on the 57th National Film Awards as Amitabh Bachchan won the Best Actor Award for his performance in Paa and Aamir Khan-starrer 3 Idiots was adjudged the Best Popular Movie but it was Malayalam drama Kutty Srank which walked away with five awards, including the best feature film.

As soon as the awards were announced, Big B's actor son Abhishek Bachchan wrote on microblogging site Twitter: I'm a proud father today.My son just won the national award for his performance in Paa!!!!!! "

He further tweeted: "Paa has won 4 national awards!!! So excuse me for a while going off to do the monkey dance!!!!! Auro, auro, auro!!!!!!"

This is Amitabh's third National Award for Best Actor. He had earlier won for Agneepath and Black. The megastar had also bagged Best Newcomer for his debut film Saat Hindustani in 1970.

Southern superstar Mohan Lal also congratulated Big B on his latest award: "Hearty Congratulations to you sir! Truly a well deserved performance!!"

Kutty Srank, with Mammoothy in the lead, also won awards for Best Cinematography, Best Screenplay, Best Costume and a Special Jury recognition, which it shared with Bollywood hit Kaminey and Malayalam film Kerala Varma Pazhassi Raja.

Rakeysh Omprakash Mehra's Delhi 6, shot in the bylanes of Old Delhi, bagged the Nargis Dutt award for Best Feature Film on National Integration while Shyam Benegal's Well Done Abba was chosen as the Best Film on Social Issues.

R Balki's Paa, was also named the Best Hindi Film, besides winning recognitions in the Best SupportingActress category (Arundhuti Nag) and Best Make-up (Christein Tinsley and Dominie Till).

Amit Trivedi got the Best Music Director award for Anurag Kashyap's Dev-D, a modern take on Sarat Chandra Chattopadhyay's classic Devdas.

The emotional number Behti Hawa Aa Tha Woh from 3 Idiots bagged the Best Lyrics award for Swanand Kirkere.

Ananya Chatterjee was named the best actress for her role in the Bengali film Abohoman, which also fetched the Best Direction award for Rituparno Ghosh and Best Editing for Arghyakamal Mitra, besides being adjudged the Best Bengali movie.

Farooq Sheikh was named the Best Supporting Actor for his role in Sanjay Puran Singh Chauhan's Lahore, which also won the Indira Gandhi Award for Best Debut Film.

Rupam Islam was chosen as the best male playback singer for his rendering of Kolkata in the Bengali filmMahanagar, while the Best Female Playback was awarded to Nilanjana Sarkar for another Bengali movie Houseful.

While producer Reliance Big Picture and Director Shaji N Karun of Kutty Srank will get the Swarna Kamal and Rs 2,50,000 each, the producer and director of 3 Idiots - Vidhu Vinod Chopra and Raj Kumar Hirani - would get the Swarna Kamal and Rs 2,00,000 each.

Bachchan would get a Rajat Kamal and Rs 50,000. The awards were announced by chairpersons of each of the three juries for feature films, non-feature films and film writing.

Ramesh Sippy, chairperson of the jury on feature films, said the system adopted for selection of movies thistime was a two-tier one in which a regional jury first screened the films from five regions after which a centraljury went through them.

He said that based on discussions, the jury had decided to recall five films which had not made it in thefirst list at the level of the regional juries. Out of these, two - Natrang (Best Film in Marathi) and Houseful (Best Female Playback) won awards.

The Best Children's Film award was shared by Putaani Party in Kannada and Keshu in Malayalam. Jeeva and Anba Karaus share the best child actor award.

Telegu film Magadheera bagged awards for special effects and choreography.

Well known music director Ilayaraja got the award for the award best background score for Kerala Verma Pazasi Raja.

The Best Audiography award was shared by Oscar winner Resool Pookutty for Kerala Varma Pazhassi Raja, Subash Sahoo (location sound) for Kaminey and Anup Dev (re-recordist of the final missed track) for 3 Idiots.

Effusive in his praise for Bachchan, Sippy said, "To portray Auro's role was not easy" and compared to the rest of the performances, there was hardly any discussion on it."

Bachchan had earlier won national awards for his performances in Black (2005, Best Actor), Agneepath (1990, Best Actor) and Saat Hindustani (1969, Best Newcomer).

Sippy said that for most of the decisions, there was no tussle. "We did deliberate, but fortunately it was not very difficult. Almost every decision was unanimous".

Anjuli Shukla became the first woman camera person to win the award for best cinematography for Kutty Srank.

The best film award in Assamese was bagged by Basundahara, Bengali - Abohomaan, Kannada - KanasembaKudureyameri, Konkani - Palatadcho Munis, Malayalam - Kerala Varma Pazhassi Raja, Tamil - Pasanga.

The jury made a special mention of actress Padmapriya for the "range and skill of an actor to portray variedcharacters in films of different languages".

In the non-feature film category, the best film awardwas shared by The Postman and Bilal. The producer anddirector of each will get the Swarna Kamal and Rs 75,000 each.

Kaushal Oza and Tathagat Singha got the best debutnon-feature film director award for their films Vaishnav JanToh and Ekti Kaktaliyo Golpo.

Mike Pandey, chairperson of the jury for non-featurefilms, made a special mention of Nilika Bhagat for her"evocative and path breaking camera work" in Vilay.

There were 136 entries in the feature films categoryand 114 entries for the non-feature film category.

Best Playback Singer (Female): Nilanjana Sarkar for Housefull
Best Playback Singer (Male) Rupam Islam for Mahanagar
Best Film: Kutty Srank (Malayalam)
Best Background Score: Illayaraja
Best Malayalam Film: Pazzhassi Raja
Best Playback Singer (Female): Nilanjana Sarkar
Best Music: Amit Trivedi, Dev D
Best Film on social awareness: Well Done Abba
Best Lyrics Award: Swanand Kirkere for Behti Hawa Sa, (3 Idiots)
Nargis Dutt award for Best Film with Social Message: Delhi-6