National Film Award for Best Debut Film of a Director

The National Film Award for Best Debut Film of a Director is one of the National Film Awards presented annually by the National Film Development Corporation of India. It is one of several awards presented for feature films and awarded with Golden Lotus (Swarna Kamal).

National Film Award for Best Debut Film of a Director
National award for contributions to Indian Cinema
Awarded for	Best debutant directorial work of a year
Sponsored by	National Film Development Corporation of India
Formerly called	Award for Best First Film of a Director (1980–1983) Indira Gandhi Award for Best First Film of a Director (1984–2009) Indira Gandhi Award for Best Debut Film of a Director (2010–2021)
Reward(s)	Swarna Kamal (Golden Lotus) ₹3,00,000
First award	1980
Final award	2022
Most recent winner	Pramod Kumar, Fouja
Highlights
Total awarded	45
First winner	Maina Tadanta
Website	http://dff.gov.in/

The award was instituted in 1980, at 28th National Film Awards^[1] and has been awarded annually for films produced in the year across the country, in all Indian languages; Hindi (11 Awards), Bengali and Malayalam (9 Awards each), Tamil (5 Awards), Marathi (3 Awards), Assamese, English and Telugu (2 each), Haryanvi, Jasari, Karbi and Ladakhi (1 Each).

The award includes 'Golden Lotus Award' (Swarna Kamal) and cash prize. Until 69th edition, the award was given to director and producer. The name was shortened to Best Debut Film of a Director since 70th National Film Awards,^[2][3] and the director alone is awarded. The prize money was increased to ₹3,00,000.^[4]

Winners

Indicates a joint award for that year

1980–2021

List of award films, showing the year (award ceremony), language(s), producer(s) and director(s)
Year	Film(s)	Language(s)	Producer(s)	Director(s)	Refs.
1980 (28th)	Maina Tadanta	Bengali	–	Utpalendu Chakrabarty	[1]
1981 (29th)	Aadharshila	Hindi	Ashok Ahuja	Ashok Ahuja	[5]
1982 (30th)	Kann Sivanthaal Mann Sivakkum	Tamil	R. Venkat Raman	Sreedhar Rajan	[6]
1983 (31st)	Jaane Bhi Do Yaaro	Hindi	NFDC	Kundan Shah	[7]
1984 (32nd)	Meendum Oru Kaathal Kathai	Tamil	Radhika Pothan	Prathap K. Pothan	[8]
1985 (33rd)	New Delhi Times	Hindi	P. K. Tiwari	Romesh Sharma	[9]
1986 (34th)	Yeh Woh Manzil To Nahin	Hindi	Sudhir Mishra	Sudhir Mishra	[10]
1987 (35th)	Ekti Jiban	Bengali	Chalchitra	Raja Mitra	[11]
1988 (36th)	Trishagni	Hindi	Nabendu Ghosh	Nabendu Ghosh	[12]
1989 (37th)	Wosobipo	Karbi	Karbi Anglong District Council	Gautam Bora	[13]
1990 (38th)	Perumthachan	Malayalam	G. Jayakumar	Ajayan	[14]
1991 (39th)	Haladhar	Assamese	• Geeti Barua  • Dwijen Hazorika	Sanjeev Hazorika	[15]
1992 (40th)	Miss Beatty's Children	English	• NFDC  • Doordarshan  • Rooks AV	Pamela Rooks	[16]
1993 (41st)	Sunya Theke Suru	Bengali	• H. Das  • Madhumanti Maitra  • M. Das	Ashoke Viswanathan	[17]
1994 (42nd)	Mogamul	Tamil	J. Dharmambal	Gnana Rajasekaran	[18]
1995 (43rd)	Kahini	Bengali	• Chandramala Bhattacharya  • Malaya Bhattacharya	Malaya Bhattacharya	[19]
1996 (44th)	Rag Birag	Assamese	• Bhabhen Baruah  • Khanin Baruah	Bidyut Chakraborty	[20]
1997 (45th)	Bhoothakkannadi	Malayalam	Nair Krishnakumar Unni	A. K. Lohithadas	[21]
1998 (46th)	Daya	Malayalam	C. K. Gopinath	Venu	[22]
1999 (47th)	Dollar Dreams	English	Sekhar Kammula	Sekhar Kammula	[23]
	Laado	Haryanvi	Kumud Chaudhary	Ashwini Chaudhary
2000 (48th)	Sayahnam	Malayalam	M. S. Nazeer	R. Sarath	[24]
2001 (49th)	Thilaadanam	Telugu	NFDC	K. N. T. Sastry	[25]
2002 (50th)	Patalghar	Bengali	Niti Sonee Gourisaria	Abhijit Chaudhuri	[26]
	Prohor	Bengali	Debjani Gupta	Subhadro Chaudhary
2003 (51st)	Margam	Malayalam	Rajiv Vijay Raghavan	Rajiv Vijay Raghavan	[27]
2004 (52nd)	Grahanam	Telugu	N. Anji Reddy	Mohan Krishna Indraganti	[28]
2005 (53rd)	Parineeta	Hindi	Vidhu Vinod Chopra	Pradeep Sarkar	[29]
2006 (54th)	Eakantham	Malayalam	Anthony Joseph	Madhu Kaithapram	[30]
	Kabul Express	Hindi	Aditya Chopra	Kabir Khan
2007 (55th)	Frozen	• Hindi  • Ladakhi	Shivajee Chandrabhushan	Shivajee Chandrabhushan	[31]
2008 (56th)	A Wednesday!	Hindi	UTV Motion Pictures	Neeraj Pandey	[32]
2009 (57th)	Lahore	Hindi	Vivek Khatkar	Sanjay Puran Singh Chauhan	[33]
2010 (58th)	Baboo Band Baaja	Marathi	Nita Jadhav	Rajesh Pinjani	[34]
2011 (59th)	Aaranya Kaandam	Tamil	S. P. Charan	Thiagarajan Kumararaja	[35]
2012 (60th)	Chittagong	Hindi	Bedabrata Pain	Bedabrata Pain	[36]
	101 Chodyangal	Malayalam	Thomas Kottackkakom	Sidhartha Siva
2013 (61st)	Fandry	Marathi	• Navalkha Arts  • Holy Basil Combine	Nagraj Manjule	[37]
2014 (62nd)	Asha Jaoar Majhe	Bengali	• For Films  • Salaam Cinema	Aditya Vikram Sengupta	[38]
2015 (63rd)	Masaan	Hindi	Phantom Films	Neeraj Ghaywan	[39]
2016 (64th)	Alifa	Bengali	Amaan Ahmed	Deep Choudhury	[40]
2017 (65th)	Sinjar	Jasari	Shibu G. Suseelan	Pampally
2018 (66th)	Naal	Marathi	Nagraj Manjule	Sudhakar Reddy Yakkanti	[41][42]
2019 (67th)	Helen	Malayalam	Vineeth Sreenivasan	Mathukutty Xavier
2020 (68th)	Mandela	Tamil	S. Sashikanth	Madonne Ashwin	[43]
2021 (69th)	Meppadiyan	Malayalam	Unni Mukundan Films	Vishnu Mohan	[44]

2022–present

Since the 70th National Film Awards, director alone is awarded.

List of award films, showing the year (award ceremony), language(s), producer(s) and director(s)
Year	Film(s)	Language(s)	Director(s)	Refs.
2022 (70th)	Fouja	Haryanvi	Pramod Kumar	[45]
2023 (71st)	Aatmapamphlet	Marathi	Ashish Avinash Bende	[46]