The National Film Award for Best Music Direction (the Silver Lotus Award) is an honour presented annually at the National Film Awards by the

Directorate of Film Festivals The Directorate of Film Festivals in India was an organisation that initiated and presented the International Film Festival of India, the National Film Awards and the Indian Panorama. Although the Directorate helped appoint members of the jury ...

to a musician who has composed the best score for films produced within the

Indian film industry The Cinema of India consists of motion pictures produced in India, which had a large effect on world cinema since the late 20th century. Major centers of film production across the country include Mumbai, Chennai, Hyderabad, Visakhapatnam, Ko ...

. The award was first introduced at the

15th National Film Awards The 15th National Film Awards, presented by Ministry of Information and Broadcasting, India to felicitate the best of Indian Cinema released in 1967. Ceremony took place at Vigyan Bhavan, New Delhi on 25 November 1968 and awards were given by ...

in 1967. At the 42nd National Film Awards, an award for "Best Background Score" was instituted. It was however discontinued after that, and it was not until 2009 that the category was re-introduced. A total of 51 awards—including award for Best Background score—to 40 different composers. Although the Indian film industry produces films in around 20 languages and dialects, the recipients of the award include those who have worked in seven major languages:

Hindi Hindi ( Devanāgarī: or , ), or more precisely Modern Standard Hindi (Devanagari: ), is an Indo-Aryan language spoken chiefly in the Hindi Belt region encompassing parts of northern, central, eastern, and western India. Hindi has been ...

(19 awards),

Tamil Tamil may refer to: * Tamils, an ethnic group native to India and some other parts of Asia **Sri Lankan Tamils, Tamil people native to Sri Lanka also called ilankai tamils **Tamil Malaysians, Tamil people native to Malaysia * Tamil language, nativ ...

(10 awards),

Malayalam Malayalam (; , ) is a Dravidian languages, Dravidian language spoken in the Indian state of Kerala and the union territories of Lakshadweep and Puducherry (union territory), Puducherry (Mahé district) by the Malayali people. It is one of 2 ...

(9 awards), Telugu (8 awards),

Bengali Bengali or Bengalee, or Bengalese may refer to: *something of, from, or related to Bengal, a large region in South Asia * Bengalis, an ethnic and linguistic group of the region * Bengali language, the language they speak ** Bengali alphabet, the w ...

(7 awards),

Kannada Kannada (; ಕನ್ನಡ, ), originally romanised Canarese, is a Dravidian language spoken predominantly by the people of Karnataka in southwestern India, with minorities in all neighbouring states. It has around 47 million native s ...

(5 awards) and Marathi (2 awards). The first recipient of the award was K. V. Mahadevan who was honoured for his composition in the

Tamil film Tamil cinema, also known as Kollywood is a part of Indian Cinema; primarily engaged in production of motion pictures in the Tamil language. Based out of the Kodambakkam neighbourhood in Chennai, Tamil Nadu, it is popularly called ''Kollywo ...

'' Kandan Karunai'' (1967). A. R. Rahman is the most frequent winner having won 6 awards. Ilaiyaraaja has won it 5 times.

Jaidev Jaidev (3 August 1918 – 6 January 1987; born Jaidev Verma) was a music composer in Hindi films, most known for his work in films: '' Hum Dono'' (1961), '' Reshma Aur Shera'' (1971), ''Prem Parbat'' (1973), ''Gharaonda'' (1977) and '' Gaman ...

and

Vishal Bhardwaj Vishal Bhardwaj (born 4 August 1965) is an Indian film director, screenwriter, producer, music composer and playback singer. He is known for his work in Hindi cinema, and is the recipient of seven National Film Awards and a Filmfare Award. Bha ...

have won it three times each. Four musicians— B. V. Karanth, K.V. Mahadevan, Satyajit Ray and

Johnson Johnson is a surname of Anglo-Norman origin meaning "Son of John". It is the second most common in the United States and 154th most common in the world. As a common family name in Scotland, Johnson is occasionally a variation of ''Johnston'', a ...

have won the award twice each. Ilaiyaraaja is the only composer to have won the award for achieving in three different languages — Telugu, Tamil and Malayalam. While A. R. Rahman won the award for performing in two different languages — Tamil and Hindi (including one for his debut film) '' Roja'' (1992). Johnson won the inaugural "Best Background Score" award—for '' Sukrutham''—in 1994. When the award was reinstated in 2009, Ilaiyaraaja won it for the Malayalam film ''

Pazhassi Raja Pazhassi Raja () (3 January 1753 – 30 November 1805) was known as Kerala Varma and was also known as Cotiote Rajah and Pychy Rajah. He was a warrior Hindu prince and de facto head of the kingdom of Kottayam, otherwise known as Cotiote, in ...

''. The most recent recipients are

Thaman S Ghantasala Sai Srinivas Thaman (born 16 November 1983), known professionally as Thaman S, earlier as S S Thaman, is an Indian music composer, professional drummer, and playback singer who predominantly works in Telugu films and Tamil films. Th ...

for Best Songs for his work in the Telugu film ''

Ala Vaikunthapurramuloo ''Ala Vaikunthapurramuloo'' () (), also known by the initialism ''AVPL'', is a 2020 Indian Telugu-language action drama film written and directed by Trivikram Srinivas. The film stars Allu Arjun and Pooja Hegde, alongside Tabu, Jayaram, Susha ...

'' and G. V. Prakash Kumar for Background Score for his work in the Tamil film ''

Soorarai Pottru ''Soorarai Pottru'' () is a 2020 Indian Tamil-language drama film that was written and directed by Sudha Kongara, and produced by Suriya, Jyothika and Guneet Monga. Kongara and Shalini Usha Nair wrote the screenplay; Aalif Surti and Ganeshaa p ...

''.

Winners

Notes

References

External links

Official Page for Directorate of Film Festivals, India

National Film Awards Archives
{{DEFAULTSORT:National Film Award For Best Music Direction

Music Music is generally defined as the art of arranging sound to create some combination of form, harmony, melody, rhythm or otherwise expressive content. Exact definitions of music vary considerably around the world, though it is an aspe ...

Film awards for Best Music Director Indian music awards India music-related lists