National Film Award for Best Debut Film of a Director (non-feature film)

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 non-feature films and awarded with Golden Lotus (Swarna Kamal).

National Film Award for Best Debut Film of a Director
National award for contributions to non-feature films
Awarded for	Best debutant directorial work for a short film of a year
Sponsored by	National Film Development Corporation of India
Formerly called	National Film Award for Best First Non-Feature Film of a Director (1991–2021)
Reward(s)	Swarna Kamal (Golden Lotus) ₹3,00,00
First award	1991 (Instituted in 1989)
Final award	2023
Most recent winner	Shilpika Bordoloi
Highlights
Total awarded	29
First winner	Reena Mohan

The award was instituted in 1989, at 37th National Film Awards and awarded annually for films produced in the year across the country, in all Indian languages. Since the 70th National Film Awards, the name was changed to "Best Debut Film of a Director" and was changed the status from Silver Lotus to Golden Lotus.^[1] Also, the director is alone eligible for the award since this edition.

Winners

Award includes 'Rajat Kamal' (Silver Lotus) and cash prize. Following are the award winners over the years:

Indicates a joint award for that year

1992–present

List of award recipients, showing the year, film(s), language(s), producer(s) and director(s)
Year	Film(s)	Language(s)	Producer(s)	Director(s)	Refs.
1991 (39th)	Kamlabai	• Marathi  • Hindi	Reena Mohan	Reena Mohan	[2]
1992 (40th)	Knock-Out	Tamil	B. Lenin	B. Lenin	[3]
1993 (41st)	Bazar Sitaram	Hindi	Neena Gupta for Films Division	Neena Gupta	[4]
1994 (42nd)	A Little War	Hindi	FTII	Atanu Biswas	[5]
1995 (43rd)	All Alone If Need Be	English	Amulya Kakati	Ranjit Das	[6]
1996 (44th)	Yeh Woh Sahar To Nahin	Hindi	FTII	Sudhakar Rao	[7]
1997 (45th)	Mizhavu – A Silent Drum Beat	English	P. D. Raphel	K. R. Subhash	[8]
1998 (46th)	Repentance	Malayalam	Mohan Agashe for Films Division	Rajeev Raj	[9]
1999 (47th)	Deivangal Padiyirangumbol (When Gods Depart)	Tamil	Pradeep Kumar	Pradeep Kumar	[10]
2000 (48th)	Meena Jha	Hindi	Satyajit Ray Film and Television Institute	Anjalika Sharma	[11]
2001 (49th)	Diary of a Housewife	Malayalam	• Asha Joseph  • Vinod Sukumaran	Vinod Sukumaran	[12]
2002 (50th)	Paramapatham	Tamil	Film and Television Institute of Tamil Nadu	Prabhu Radhakrishnan	[13]
	Beyond or Within	English	P. T. M. Payyoli	Vinod Mankara
2003 (51st)	An Encounter with a Life Living	• Hindi  • English	Vinu Abraham	Suja	[14]
2004 (52nd)	Ek Sagar Kinaree... A Seaside Story	• Marathi  • English	Gomantak Marathi Academy	Laxmikant Shetgaonkar	[15]
2005 (53rd)	John and Jane	English	Ashim Ahluwalia	Ashim Ahluwalia	[16]
2006 (54th)	Andhiyum	Malayalam	N. Dinesh Rajkumar	Jacob Varghese	[17]
2007 (55th)	Lal Juto	Bengali	Satyajit Ray Film and Television Institute	Shweta Merchant	[18]
2008 (56th)	Vitthal	Marathi	• Vinoo Choliparambil  • Manu Pushpendran	Vinoo Choliparambil	[19]
2009 (57th)	Vaishnav Jan Toh	Hindi	FTII	Kaushal Oza	[20]
	Ekti Kaktaliyo Golpo	Bengali	FTII	Tathagata Singha
2010 (58th)	Pistulya	• Marathi  • Telugu	Nagraj Manjule	Nagraj Manjule	[21]
2011 (59th)	The Silent Poet	Meitei	Borun Thokchom	Borun Thokchom	[22]
2012 (60th)	Eka Gachha Eka Manisa Eka Samudra	Oriya	Veenu Bhushan Vaid	Lipika Singh Darai	[23]
2013 (61st)	Kanyaka	Malayalam	Satyajit Ray Film and Television Institute	Christo Tomy	[24]
2014 (62nd)	Goonga Pehelwan		Drishti Media	• Mit Jani  • Prateek Gupta  • Vivek Chaudhary	[25]
2015 (63rd)	Daaravtha	Marathi	Nishantroy Bombarde	Nishantroy Bombarde	[26]
2016 (64th)	Soz...A Ballad of Maladies		Rajiv Mehrotra	Tushar Madhav	[27]
2017 (65th)	Water Baby		Varun Shah	Pia Shah
2018 (66th)	Feluda: 50 Years of Ray's Detective		Sagnik Chatterjee	Sagnik Chatterjee
2019 (67th)	Khisa	Marathi	Santosh Maithani	Raj Pritam More	[28]
2020 (68th)	Pariah	• Marathi  • Hindi	MIT School of Film & Television	Vishesh Iyer	[29]
2021 (69th)	Paanchika		Shreya Kapadiya	Ankit Kothari	[30]

2022–present

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

List of award films, showing the year (award ceremony), language(s) and director(s)
Year	Film(s)	Language(s)	Director(s)	Refs.
2022 (70th)	Madhyantara	Kannada	Basti Dinesh Shenoy	[31]
2023 (71st)	Mau: The Spirit Dreams of Cheraw	Mizo	Shilpika Bordoloi	[32]