2006 National Awards

The delay in announcing the 2005 National Awards led to the awards for 2006 being delayed too and they were finally announced 2 days ago. As happened last year, there were several news items about the awards but none that provided an easy-to-read list of the awards. So for your reading pleasure, here is the most complete, consolidated list of award-recipients that I could come up with.

Best picture - Pulijanmam
Best Director - Madhur Bhandarkar (Traffic Signal)
Best Actor - Soumitra Chatterjee (Podokkhep)
Best Actress - Priyamani (Paruthi Veeran)
Best Supporting Actor - Dilip Prabhavalkar (Lage Raho Munnabhai, Shevri)
Best Supporting Actress - Konkona Sen Sharma (Omkara)
Best Music Direction - Ashok Patki (Antarnad)
Best Lyrics - Swanand Kirkire (Lage Raho Munnabhai)
Best Cinematography - Goutam Ghose (Yatra)
Best Screenplay - Prakash Jha, Shridhar Raghavan and Manoj Tyagi (Lage Raho Munnabhai)
Best Art Direction - Rashid Rangrez (Waris Shah-Ishq Da Waris)
Best Costume Designer - Manjit Mann (Waris Shah-Ishq Da Waris)
Best Choreography - Madhu Samudra and Sajeev Samudra (Ratri Mazha)
Best Makeup - Anil Motiram Palande (Traffic Signal)
Best Child Artist - Divya Chahadkar (Antarnad)
Best Special Effects - EFX, Chennai (Krrish)
Best First Film of a director - Kabul Express (Kabir Khan), Ekantham, (Madhu Kaithapuram)
Best Popular Film providing Wholesome Entertainment - Lage Raho Munnabhai
Best Audiography - K J Singh and Subhash Sahoo (Omkara)
Best Editing - Raja Mohamed (Paruthi Veeran)
Best Male Playback Singer - Gurdas Mann (Waris Shah-Ishq Da Waris)
Best Female Playback Singer - Aarti Anklekar Tikekar (Antarnad)
Best Feature Film on National Integration - Kallarli Huvagi
Best Film on Family Welfare - Karutha Pakshikal (Malayalam), Faltu (Bengali)
Best Film on Other Social Issues - Hope (Telugu)
Best Children’s Film - Footpath (Kannada)
Best Film Critic - G P Ramachandran (Malayalam) and Rafique Baghdadi (English)
Best Animation Film - Kittu (Telugu)
Special Jury award - Omkara

Best Hindi Film - Khosla Ka Ghosla
Best Tamil Film - Veyyil
Best Kannada Film - Kaada Beladingalu
Best Malayalam Film - Drishtantham
Best Telugu Film - Kamli

It was slim pickings for Tamil cinema again but we atleast did end up with a biggie, thanks to Priyamani. But unlike last year, when all awards were scooped up by movies I'd not heard, let alone seen, the awards this time were won by 2 movies I've seen. Paruthi Veeran was released only in 2007 but looks like it was submitted for the awards in 2006. Thank God for that since it helped us get 2 awards. And Veyyil deservedly won the Award for Best Tamil Film.

With Paruthi Veeran out of the way, Tamil cinema's share of the 2007 National awards is probably not going to be much bigger. And though 2008 has been a really bad year so far, I'm hoping that Dasaavathaaram and Naan Kadavul make it a good year when its award time.