The news of Kiran Rao’s film Laapta Ladies entering the Oscars on Monday brought huge joy to movie lovers. The Film Federation of India (FFI) has announced that “The Missing Lady” will be India’s official entry for the 2024 Oscars. But on Tuesday, news came that Randeep Hooda-starrer Swatantraveer Savarkar will also attend the Oscars.
Now fans are confused, which of these two films will ultimately win an Oscar? Because each country only selects one film and sends it to the Oscars. If other films in the country wanted to, they could stand alone at the Oscars and get nominated. So now the question is whether ‘Swatantryaveer Savarkar’ has been sent in contention for an Oscar?
What is chaos?
Sandeep Singh, one of the producers of “Swatantryaveer Savarkar”, shared the film’s poster on social media on Tuesday, which read “Official submission for Oscars 2024”. The poster also thanked the Film Federation of India in small print.
Sandeep wrote in the caption of the post, “Feeling honored and humbled! Our film ‘Swatantryaveer Savarkar’ has been officially submitted for Oscar nomination. Thanks to the Film Federation of India for the huge appreciation. The journey has been incredible and we are so grateful To all of you who support us in this journey this whole mess started after Sandeep published this article.
What does the Film Federation have to say about this confusion?
FFI president Ravi Kottakara spoke to Hindustan Times on the matter. He laughed and said, “They (the makers of Savarkar) have received some wrong information. I will also make a statement on this. India has only officially sent Missing Lady.”
Anand Pandit, another co-producer of “Swatantryaveer Savarkar”, was also unaware of such a thing. “I didn’t know the movie had been submitted, I just found out on Monday,” he said. “Going to the Oscars is a big deal.” Obviously I’m happy. However, the film’s producer and actor Randeep Hooda did not say anything similar on social media.
The truth behind Randeep Hooda’s film’s Oscar bid
Every year, the Film Federation of India selects a film to represent India and officially send it to the Oscars. Each year a number of films are shortlisted from those already released and the FFI jury selects one after viewing.
This time FFI selected one film from 29 shortlisted films. In addition to “The Missing Lady”, “Kalki 2898 AD”, “Sam Bahadur”, “Animal” and “Maida” “An” and other films were also shortlisted. “Swatantryaveer Savarkar” is one of these 29 films. Maybe Sandeep Singh is in some confusion about this. But the fact is that India’s official contender for the 2024 Oscars is “The Lady is Missing.”
