Madhur Bhandarkar

Shri Madhur Ramchandra Bhandarkar is a renowned National Award-winning Indian film director, producer and script-writer best known for making hard-hitting realistic and middle of the road cinema.

Born in a middle class Maharashtrian family, Shri Bhandarkar's fascination for cinema began when he was a kid. Though he could not complete his studies, he did several odd jobs including running a video cassette library at the age of 16 where he used to do door to door delivery of cassettes on a bicycle. This gave him access to a large collection of movies and he studied film-making through it. Satyajit Ray, Guru Dutt, Shyam Benegal and Mani Ratnam have been his inspiration for filmmaking.

He has always been an avid reader of books and his friends call him an encyclopedia of Hindi Cinema. He is also known for his one liners and amazing sense of humor among film fraternity. Though he himself has not attended an educational institute, he has been a motivational speaker at various education centers in India and abroad. His highly acclaimed and commercially successful films like Chandni Bar, Satta, Page 3, Corporate, Traffic Signal, Fashion, Heroine and others have mirrored societal issues often showing the dark side of reality. He is often described as a torch - bearer for women -centric films in modern era, starting the trend more than a decade ago, since Chandni Bar (2001).

Today, Shri Madhur Bhandarkar has carved a unique space for his genre of cinema and is recognized in our country and all over the world as a successful filmmaker.

Shri Bhandarkar has been awarded National Awards for Chandani Bar, Page 3, Traffic Signal and Gangasharan Singh president award (2009) by the HRD ministry along with renowned film personalities like Shyam Benegal and Girish Karnad. He was given the Lions Gold Award four times (2005, 2006, 2007 and 2009) and Kalakaar award twice (2007 and 2014). He was also conferred Raj Kapoor Smriti Award (2014) by Maharashtra State Government and Iconic Man of the Decade by Women Economic Forum held in Goa in 2015. His other awards include Kesari Gaurav Sanman from Maharashtra (2010), Film Federation IMPAA Awards (2011) and a very prestigious P L Deshpande Award (2010) among many others that he has been felicitated with.

He has also been given an Honorary Doctorate Degree in field of Arts by Gujarat based Rai University in 2016.



Shri Bhandarkar has also been honoured at many international film festivals like Zimbabwe International Film Festival (2003), Cairo International Film Festival (2009), Moscow Film Festival (2009), Indian film Festival, Berlin (2012) and Syracuse Film Festival (2013). He was honored by the Ministry of Culture, Russia in 2009, with Creative spirit and Visionary Director’s Award at House of Commons, UK (2013 – 14) and by the office of Public Advocate, New York in 2013. He was also given the Rafi Peer Memorial Award in Lahore, Pakistan (2016) for his immense contribution in highlighting social issues in sensitive manner and for portrayal of strong female protagonists in his films.

His films have been part of retrospect at various national and international film festivals.