Amitabh Bachchan bags the Best Actor National award

Films from the stable of Bollywood hogged honours at the National Film Awards for 2005 with mega superstar Amitabh Bachchan bagging the Best Actor award and popular films like Rang De Basanti , Iqbal and Apaharan winning awards in different categories.

Bachchan won the Best Actor award for Black , Sarika was adjudged Best Actress for ‘ Parzania ‘ while Buddhadeb Dasgupta ‘s ‘ Kaalpurush ‘ won the Best film award in the National Awards for 2005.

‘Parzania’ also fetched the Best director award for its director Rahul Dholakia.

Bachchan was adjudged best actor ”for his dramatic rendition of a reformed alcoholic who struggles to give a physically handicapped child a new life”, while Sarika was chosen Best Actress in the English language film ‘Parzania’ ”for her rendition of a crusading mother who fights for justice against all adversity in a communally charged environment”.

Among the other Bollywood films that figured in the list of awards, which was released in New Delhi Tuesday evening, were Vishal Bharadwaj ‘s ‘Blue Umbrella’ which has been adjudged the Best children’s film ”for its poetic and visually stunning interpretation of a story highlighting the values of selflessness and compassion”.

The much popular film ‘Rang De Basanti’, which was also India’s entry to the Oscars last year, won four awards – the award for the Best popular film providing wholesome entertainment, Best Male Playback singer for Naresh Iyer, award for Best audiography for re-recordists of the final mixed track Nakul Kamte and Best editing for its editor P S Bharathi.

Playback singer Shreya Ghoshal won the Best Female Playback Singer award for her song in Paheli while Prakash Jha ‘s ‘Apharan’ won the Best screenplay award for screenplay writers Prakash Jha, Shridhar Raghavan and Manoj Tyagi.

The award for Best art direction went to the period film ‘ Taj Mahal – An Eternal Love Story’ to its art director C B More while the award for Best costume designer was bagged jointly to Anna Singh (for ‘Taj Mahal- An Eternal Love Story ) and Sabyachi Mukherjee (for ‘Black’) Nagesh Kukunoor ‘s ‘Iqbal’ (Hindi) won the award for the Best Film on Social issues.

Pradeep Sarkar ‘s period piece Parineeta has bagged the Indira Gandhi award for Best first film by a director.

Anupam Kher has won the Special Jury Award for his role in the film Maine Gandhi Ko Nahin Mara .

Among other awards, the award for the Best Child Artist went to Sai Kumar for his performance in Telugu Film ‘Bommalata – a bellyful of dreams’, award for the Best Non-Feature Film has been bagged by ‘Riding Solo to the top of the world’ (English), directed by Gaurav A Jani while the best film critic award has gone to Baradwaj Rangan.

The award for Best Choreography has gone to Saroj for Tamil film Sringaram ”in acknowledgement of the authentic recreation of the Devadasi tradition that has been brought out with immense grace and beauty.”

The best films in different Indian languages are: Asomese (‘Kadam Tole Krishna Nache’) directed by Suman Haripriya, Bengali (‘Harbart’) by Suman Mukherji, Kannada (‘Thaayi’) by Baraguru Ramchandrappa, Malayalam (‘Thanmantra’) by Blessy, Marathi (‘Dombivali Fast’) by Minishikant Kamat, Oriya (‘Katahntara’) by Himanshu Khatua, Punjabi (‘Baghi’) by Sukhminder Dhanjal, Telegu (‘Bommalata’) by Prakash Kovelamudi, Tamil (‘Aaadum Kothu’) by TV Chandran.