25 september 2024 : On Monday, the Indian film community celebrated Kiran Rao’s Laapataa Ladies being selected as the official entry for the 2025 Academy Awards. The film now aims to compete for the Best International Feature Film category against films from around the globe. However, confusion arose on Tuesday when producer Sandeep Singh announced via social media that his film Swatantrya Veer Savarkar, starring Randeep Hooda, had also been submitted for the Oscars, causing headlines to mistakenly suggest it was India’s official entry.
To clarify, Laapataa Ladies is indeed India’s official submission for the Oscars. It’s important to note that the Indian government, specifically the Ministry of Information and Broadcasting, is not involved in this selection process. Instead, the Film Federation of India (FFI) has been responsible for this task for many years. Each country can nominate one film for the Oscars, and according to the FFI, Laapataa Ladies has been selected. The film will hope to make it to the long list announced later this year, with final nominations revealed in January.
As for Swatantrya Veer Savarkar, it may also have been submitted for consideration, but not as India’s official entry. Sandeep Singh’s assertion that it was “officially” submitted created confusion, especially when he thanked the FFI and jury president Jahnu Barua, leading many to believe it had been selected by the FFI. However, FFI President Ravi Kottakara clarified in a conversation with HT City that the filmmakers of Savarkar communicated incorrectly. He stated that only Laapataa Ladies was officially sent to the Oscars from India.
This raises the question of how both films can be submitted to the Oscars when the Academy allows only one entry per country. The answer is that while there can only be one official submission, filmmakers can submit their films independently as well. This scenario occurred in 2022 when Chello Show (Last Film Show) was India’s official entry, but both RRR and Gangubai Kathiawadi were submitted independently.
Laapataa Ladies, directed by Kiran Rao, features newcomers Sparsh Srivastava, Pratibha Ranta, and Nitanshi Goel, and tells the story of two ‘lost’ brides in 1990s rural India. Although it was a commercial failure, it received critical acclaim. In contrast, Swatantrya Veer Savarkar, directed by and starring Randeep Hooda, depicts the life of activist VD Savarkar. The film was released to mixed reviews and did not perform well at the box office.
