India at the Oscars.

Mother India (1957) — Nominated:

Almost three decades after the Academy Awards were instituted, Mehboob Khan's 1957 classic Mother India, set in post-Independence rural India, was chosen as India's first submission to the Oscars.

It went on to become the first Indian film to be chosen in the final shortlist in the Best Foreign Language Film category.

Nargis's stellar performance as a gritty woman eking out a livelihood, unrelenting in the face of obstacles, won her accolades.

Mother India, however, lost out to Federico Fellini's Italian film Le Notti di Cabiria (The Nights of Cabiria).

Bhanu Athaiya for Gandhi (1982) — Won

Twenty-six years after Mother India made the shortlist at the Oscars, costume designer Bhanu Athaiya made history by becoming the first Indian to win an Oscar, in 1983.

She won the award for Best Costume Design for Sir Richard Attenborough's Gandhi (1982). She had also won a BAFTA award for the same film in the same category.

The Ben Kingsley-starrer was a biographical film on Mahatma Gandhi and swept the Oscars in 1983, including for Best Film.

Kingsley, an Indian-origin actor, took home the golden statuette for Best Actor while Attenborough won the Best Director award.

Salaam Bombay! (1988) — Nominated

Six years later, India won another Oscar nomination when Mira Nair's Salaam Bombay! (1988) was nominated in the Best Foreign Language Film category.

As the name suggests, the film explores and documents the extraordinary lives of ordinary street urchins in Bombay. Nair paid a graphic tribute to the city's contemporary street life and its frivolous spirit.

Satyajit Ray — An Honorary Award



In 1992, the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences bestowed an Honorary Award for Lifetime Achievement on Satyajit Ray, one of India's most distinguished filmmakers. Ray is the only Indian till date to have secured that distinction.

A genius, Ray was the brain behind examplar films like Pather Panchali, Charulata, Aranyer Din Ratri, Teen Kanya, and Devi. So widespread was his international esteem that Japanese filmmaker Akira Kurosawa once declared, "Not to have seen the cinema of Ray means existing in the world without seeing the sun or the moon."

Elizabeth (1998) — Won

Bandit Queen director Shekhar Kapur's 1998 biographical drama on England's seventeenth century queen, Elizabeth, with Cate Blanchett in the title role, won seven Oscar nominations in 1999, including for Best Film and Best Actress. It won an Oscar for Best Makeup.

The film's 2007 sequel Elizabeth: The Golden Age, again earned Blanchett the Best Actress nomination and the Best Costume Design award for the film, but Kapur missed out again.

Lagaan (2001) — Nominated

Ashutosh Gowariker's Lagaan was the third Hindi film to be nominated for an Oscar in the Best Foreign Language Film category.

The Aamir Khan-starrer was the first among a string of Hindi films based on the theme of British colonialism that hit the screens in the early 2000s. The film offered Indian audiences an enchanting combination of its favourites — Bollywood and cricket.

Lagaan lost out to the Bosnian war film No Man's Land. But Khan got a lot of flak and was labelled a hypocrite for attending the Oscar ceremony after claiming that he hated attending award functions.

Little Terrorist (2004) — Nominated


In 2004, a short film called Little Terrorist, directed by Ashvin Kumar, was nominated in the Short Film Live Action category at the Oscars.

Screened at a number of international film festivals, Little Terrorist narrates the story a of a Pakistani boy who accidentally crosses the Indian border and lands in trouble with the Indian security forces.

Water (2006) — Nominated

Deepta Mehta's film was the last in her trilogy, with Fire (1996) and Earth (1998) preceding it. In 2007, Water was nominated for the Best Foreign Language Film at the Oscars.

Starring Lisa Roy, John Abraham, Seema Biswas, and Waheeda Rehman, Water focused on some of the evils of Hindu society and the pathetic condition of widows in pre-Independence India.


Reviewing the film, The New York Times said, "Serene on the surface yet roiling underneath, the film neatly parallels the plight of widows under Hindu fundamentalism to that of India under British colonialism."

Slumdog Millionaire (2008)

Danny Boyle's Slumdog Millionaire (2008) was an international sensation and an Oscar powerhouse, winning eight awards after being nominated in 10 categories.

The film not only won the Best Picture and Best Director awards, but also got music maestro AR Rahman his first golden statuettes — for Best Original Score and Best Original Song 'Jai Ho!'.

Resul Pookutty won the award for Best Sound Mixing — India's first Oscar for technical excellence.

With an appealing dramatic romantic plot set in the heart of Mumbai, Slumdog Millionaire grabbed eyeballs all over the world and catapulted its lead actors Dev Patel and Freida Pinto to international stardom.

Smile Pinki (2008) — Won

American director Megan Mylan's 39-minute documentary Smile Pinki (2008) won the Oscar for Best Documentary (Short Subject).

The documentary tells the story of a little girl from rural Uttar Pradesh who was born with a cleft lip.

The film takes the viewer through the girl's life which is transformed when she gets a generous offer of free surgery.