Highly acclaimed Bengali film director Tapan Sinha, it was decided on Monday, July 21, will be presented with the coveted Dadasaheb Phalke award for the year 2006. Tapan Sinha, who is 84 years old, is presently recuperating from a heart attack in a Kolkata hospital and has expressed his gratitude to the government for bestowing such an honor. 

Tapan Sinha has had an illustrious career in the film-making business, which won him substantial praise and awards from the international as well as the domestic film circuit. He has won 19 national film awards in various categories. Tapan Sinha will now be awarded with a Swarna Kamal, a cash prize of Rs.10 lakh and a shawl by President Pratibha Patil at a function whose date has not been decided yet.

Although he is primarily based in the Bengali film industry, he has also made films in different languages like Hindi and Oriya in the past. The noted Bengali filmmaker infact is considered the most uncompromising filmmaker outside the orbit of parallel cinema. 

Tapan Sinha, who started his career in 1946 as a sound engineer in Kolkata’s New Theatre is accredited with the making of several renowned films like ‘Kabuliwala,’ ‘Khudito Pashaan,’ ‘Atithi,’ ‘Upahar,’ ‘Haatey Bazarey,’ ‘Sagina Mahato,’ ‘Hansuli Baker Upakatha,’ ‘Adalat O Ekti Meye,’ ‘Ek Doctor Ki Maut,’ ‘Bancharamer Bagan’ and ‘Shatabdir Kanya,’ among others. His maximum films capture the down-to-earth depictions of the struggles of the common man.