NEW DELHI: Hansal Mehta has won the best director award for Shahid at the 13th annual New York Indian Film Festival (NYIFF) while Anumati by Gajendra Ahire was declared the Best Film.

The veteran Vikram Gokhale received the best actor award for Anumati, the film which got him the same award at the National Film Awards earlier this month.

The veteran Deepti Naval was declared the Best Actress for Listen Amaya while Suraj Negi won the Best Child Actor for Hansa.

Dr. Biju won the Best Screenplay for Color of Sky.

The Only Real Game by Mirra Bank was declared the Best Documentary while Khaana by Cary Sawhney won the Best Short film.

Shahid is based on the life of slain human rights activist and lawyer Shahid Azmi. Anumati revolves around a retired teacher‘s attempt to save his dying wife.

Filmistaan by Nitin Kakkar, which had won the best Hindi film award at the National Film Awards on 3 May, was the closing film of the New York Festival. It stars Sharib Hashmi, Kumud Mishra, Gopal Datt, and Inaamulhaq. Dekh Tamasha Dekh which was also a winner at the National Film Awards opened the Festival. It is directed by Feroz Abbas Khan.and stars Satish Kaushik, Tanvi Azmi, Sudhir Pandey, Vinay Jain, Sharad Ponkshe, Ganesh Yadav, Apoorva Arora, and Alok Rajwade.

The Festival screened Uday Shankar‘s Kalpana made in 1948 to mark a centenary of Indian cinema, while the restored version of Garam Hawa by M S Sathyu was also screened.

The Festival had a section on mobile phone cinema, Human Rights cinema. There were separate sections of Bengali and Marathi films.

Presented by the Indo-American Arts Council, the annual festival was held from 30 April to 4 May. Other films included ‘Midnight‘s Children‘ and ‘The Reluctant Fundamentalist‘ by Mira Nair.