President Pranab Mukherjee today gave away trophies to the winners of the 62nd National Film Awards including the best feature film to debut director Chaitanya Tamhane and best actress to Bollywood star Kangana Ranaut for her role in ‘Queen’.

Veteran actor Shashi Kapoor, this year’s Dada Saheb Phalke winner, could not attend the ceremony due to ill health. The actor will be honoured in a special ceremony in Mumbai.

My special congratulation is to Shri Shashi Kapoor, who has been honoured with the Dadasaheb Phalke Award this year.His contribution to cinema has been manifold and tremendous.He is a true living legend.
–Pranab Mukherjee, President of India

Union Information and Broadcasting Minister, Arun Jaitley, also congratulated Kapoor and praised his family’s contribution to Indian cinema.

“The contribution of his illustrious family to Indian cinema is immense and Shri Shashi Kapoor has played a unique part by producing a number of meaningful films as well as performing in well-known international productions,” he said.

The President and the Minister, while praising the film industry for its evolved content over the century, called it an integral part of India’s “soft power” internationally.

Kangana, 28, won her career’s second National award in the Vikas Bahl’s coming-of-age drama, ‘Queen’. The actress said movie sets were her film school. 

“Whatever I learnt, I learnt on the movie sets as I got the opportunity to work with some of the greatest directors,” the actress said before the ceremony.

Dressed in a Bibhu Mohapatra gown, Kangana was the star-attraction at the event and was constantly mobbed by eager fans for photos and autographs. She left the event just after getting her trophy from the President.

Bahl and producer Vikramditya Motwane were also awarded for ‘Queen’ which won its second trophy for best Hindi film.

‘Court’, a powerful and stark depiction of the mundaneness of judicial procedure, was given the best feature film award.

Its director Chaitanya Tamhane got a special mention in the President’s speech.

Vishal Bhardwaj and Sukhwinder Singh were bestowed with the award for the best music director (Rajat Kamal and Rs 50,000) and best singer (Rajat Kamal and Rs 50,000) for “Haider”, a Kashmir-set modern adaptation of Shakespeare’s Hamlet.

Priyanka Chopra-starrer Mary Kom, a biopic on female boxer of the same name, won best popular film providing wholesome entertainment. 

Indira Gandhi Award for best debut film went to director Aditya Vikram Sengupta for his critically-acclaimed Bengali film Asha Jaoar Majhe.

In the non feature film category Tender Is the Sight was awarded best non feature film for its sensitive and lyrical portrayal of ten-year-old child who though visually challenged creates a symphony of sounds.

Speaking at the event, President Pranab Mukherjee called upon the Indian film industry to focus beyond the market by nurturing “universal human values” as he said that cinema represented in the true sense the country’s soft power.