1st Filmfare Awards

1st Filmfare Awards
Date March 21, 1954 [1]
Site Metro Cinema, Bombay
Highlights
Best Film Do Bigha Zamin
Most awards Do Bigha Zamin & Baiju Bawra (2)

The 1st Filmfare Awards were held on March 21, 1954, honoring the best in Hindi cinema in 1953. That year they were known as Clare Awards, after Clare Mendonca, film critic of The Times of India who had died in the same year.[1]

The Awards

In a short ceremony held at Metro Cinema in Bombay (now Mumbai), awards in only 5 categories were handed out.[1] The Chief Guest of function was George Allen, US Ambassador to India. The ceremony was compared by actor David, and it started with actress Nalini Jaywant singing the national anthem. This was followed by song and dance performance by various actors, musical performances by Talat Mehmood, Geeta Roy and Mohammed Rafi. Next two performance were classical dance performances by Vyjayanthimala and Surya Kumari. The finale of the performance section was a folk-dance performance, "Lure of Rajasthan" by Kamini Kaushal and her troupe.[2]

This led to the section where David announced the awards. No nominations were announced, just the winners. Keep with the voting process, where the readers of the magazine,[3] decided the winners through postal votes, even the awards were given away by readers, chosen via a lucky draw. For example, the Best Film trophy was given by Ambassador Allen to a reader, Saijuddin from Hyderabad, who in turn presented it to Bimal Roy. This was followed by Best Actress which was won by Meena Kumari for Baiju Bawra, Best Actor went to Dilip Kumar for Daag.[2] Next, Ace music director Naushad won his first and only Filmfare Award.[4] The final award Best Director was won by Bimal Roy, present by Sonny Cordiero, a reader from Mumbai.[2]

Incidentally, Bimal Roy and Dilip Kumar were the first winners of the Filmfare Award for Best Director and Filmfare Award for Best Actor respectively, and remained almost six decades later, the ones with the most wins in either category.[4] Fearing similar mob of fans, as outside Metro theatre, the venue of award party was not announced publicly. Later around hundred invitees gathered at the Wellington Gymkhana Club.[2]

Hollywood star Gregory Peck was invited to be the guest of honour at the awards but couldn't make it to the function since his flight from Colombo got delayed. However, Peck did attend the banquet that followed the award nite at Wellington Gymkhana Club, Mumbai.[2][5][6]

Best Movie

Do Bigha Zamin

Best Director

Bimal Roy - Do Bigha Zamin

Best Actress

Meena Kumari - Baiju Bawra

Best Actor

Dilip Kumar - Daag

Best Music

Naushad for the song 'Tu Ganga Ki Mauj' from Baiju Bawra

See also

References

  1. 1 2 3 "Tollywood's tryst with Black Lady". The Times of India. March 9, 2014. Retrieved 2014-04-28.
  2. 1 2 3 4 5 Brigadier Samir Bhattacharya (19 December 2013). NOTHING BUT!: Book Three: What Price Freedom. Partridge Publishing. pp. 214–215. ISBN 978-1-4828-1625-9.
  3. ↑ Aswin Punathambekar; Anandam P. Kavoori; Rachel Dwer. Global Bollywood. NYU Press. pp. 243–244. ISBN 978-0-8147-2944-1.
  4. 1 2 "The Winners - 1953". Official Listings, Filmfare Awards, Indiatimes. Retrieved May 8, 2013.
  5. ↑ "'I behaved like Gregory Peck to impress Suraiya'". The Times of India. 2003-06-14. Retrieved 2012-09-30.
  6. ↑ liveindia.com. "Filmfare Awards Facts". Liveindia.com. Retrieved 2012-09-30.

External links

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