(This article is authored by Alar) 

For the first time in his decades-long cinematic career, actor Suriya has won the National Award which has marked a stupendous breakthrough in his already-celebrating career. The actor was conferred with the prestigious award for his impressive acting in the movie 'Soorarai Pottru', which has set a glorious milestone by bagging more awards in the National Film Awards that were announced on Friday- July 22. 

The 68th National Film Awards ceremony was held in Delhi and it was organized by the Directorate of Film Festivals which comes under the Union Ministry of Information and Broadcasting. The ceremony has drawn massive attention from across the country and significantly, the blockbuster Tamil movie 'Soorarai Pottru' helmed by Sudha Kongara has been turning heads by achieving humongous recognition from the National Awards event. 

The Tamil movie industry has bagged ten National Awards and of these ten, five awards were bestowed upon Soorarai Pottru and the movie team is on cloud nine for these national honours. Besides Soorarai Pottru, the other Tamil movies that made up the list include Yogi Babu starred 'Mandela' and Parvathy starred 'Sivaranjiniyum Innum Sila Pengalum'. 

The awards were announced on the Press Information Bureau India's YouTube channel and Facebook page at 4 pm on Friday. As per the announcement, Soorarai Pottru actors Suriya and Aparna Balamurali won the National Awards for best actors. Suriya has shared the award of the Best Actor with Bollywood star Ajay Devgn for the movie 'Tanhaji', which was released in 2020.

The following is the list of awards and their winners, 

Best Feature Film- Soorarai Pottru.

Best Direction - Late director Sachidanandan for directing 'Ayyappanum Koshiyum'. 

Best Popular Film providing wholesome entertainment -  'Tanhaji' starred by Ajay Devgn. 

Best Children's Film - 'Sumi' from Marathi.

Best Film on Other social issues - Justice Delayed but Delivered - Hindi and Three Sisters from Bengali. 

Best Film on Environment Conservation/ Preservation - Taledanda from Kannada. 

Best Actor- Suriya for Soorarai Pottru and Ajay Devgn for Tanhaji. 

Best Actress - Aparna Balamurali for Soorarai Pottru. 

Best Supporting Actor - Biju Menon for Ayyappanum Koshiyum from Malayalam. 

Best Supporting Actress - Lakshmi Priya Chandramouli for 'Sivaranjiniyum Innum Sila Pengalum' from Tamil.

Best Screenplay- Sudha Kongara and Shalini Ushadevi for Soorarai Pottru from Tamil. 

Best Screenplay (Dialogues) - Madonne Ashwin for Mandela from Tamil. 

Best Consume Design -  Nachiket Barve and Mahesh Sherla for Tanhaji from Hindi. 

Best Background score - GV Prakash Kumar for Soorarai Pottru from Tamil. 

Best Tamil movie- Sivaranjiniyum Innum Sila Pengalum from Tamil 

Best Debut Director - Madonne Ashwin for Mandela from Tamil 

Best Editing - Sreekar Prasad for the Tamil movie 'Sivaranjiniyum Innum Sila Pengalum'. 

Best Female playback singer - Nanjiyamma for Ayyappanum Koshiyum from Malayalam. 

Best Music direction (songs) -  S Thaman for Ala Vaikunthapurramuloo from Telugu 

Best Lyrics - Manoj Muntashir for the movie 'Saina' from Hindi 

Best Production Design - Anees Nadodi for Kappela from Malayalam. 

Best Make-up Artist - TV Rambabu for Natyam from Telugu. 

As the awards were revealed, the recipients have been flooded with wishes from across and beyond the borders. By bagging the most number of awards, the Tamil movie industry has been celebrating the glorious milestone and the Tamil fans are relishing the announcements and extending their commendations to the recipients. Taking to Twitter, Union Minister of Information and Broadcasting, Anurag Thakur wrote, "I congratulate all the award winners; their work represents a holistic flavour of Indian cinema spanning regions & languages. I also extend my appreciation for the transparency, hard work & depth brought in by the eminent jury." 

Speaking about the awards to ANI, Thakur said, “I want to congratulate all the jury members and all those people whose work was reviewed and would like to congratulate those recipients who will be awarded the National Film Awards. A word of appreciation for everyone who has done an outstanding job.” He added, “I am glad that this year we will be holding the 68 National Film Awards since we could not hold the awards for two years because of Covid.”

It is pertinent to note that the Directorate of Film Festivals had invited online entries and the acceptable last date for entries was until March 12, 2021. Feature and Non-Feature Films certified by the Central Board of Film Certification between 1 January 2020 and 31 December 2020 were eligible for the film award categories.