It’s sad that Duronto got only one National Award: Manoj Bajpayee

Manoj Bajpayee says that he expected his upcoming film to win in more than one category.

Bollywood actor Manoj Bajpayee is known for his versatility. He recently played a homosexual in film-maker Hansal Mehta’s latest film, Aligarh. The actor will next be seen a children’s film, which has won a National Award in the Best Children’s film category.

Manoj Bajpayee calls National Awards “mercurial”. He says that he expected his upcoming film to win in more than one category. (JITU SAVLANI)

Duronto, starring Manoj Bajpai, was given the Best Children’s Film award. The film is about a forgotten child-marathon runner.

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Made by Odia film-makers Soumendra Padhi and Sabyasachi Mohapatra , the movie is based on a child marathoner, Budhia Singh, who completed a marathon from Bhubaneswar (Odisha) to Puri (Odisha) in four hours.

“I am honoured to be a part of such an amazing film. It feels good that the movie has received such a great acknowledgment. It will travel to many world film festivals soon,” says Manoj.

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However, the actor adds that he expected the film to win more than one National Award. “It’s sad that it got only one award. I was expecting it to win in more than one category. Once they watch the movie, people will think that it should have won more awards,” says Manoj.

Talking about the importance of the National Awards, the Bollywood actor says that they are “quite mercurial in nature since many years”.

He adds, “Sometimes they are so correct, but most of the times, they are mercurial.”

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