70th National Film Awards: Nitya Menen, Manasi Parekh Jointly Declared Best Actress

70th National Awards was announced today, August 16, by the Ministry of Information and Broadcasting (I&B) at a presser in New Delhi. Nithya Menen and Manasi Parekh have jointly won in the Best Actress category for the first time. Nithya has bagged the award for her performance in the 2022 Tamil movie Thiruchitrambalam, while Manasi has won for her performance in the Gujarati drama Kutch Express.

Who is Nithya Menen? 

Nithya is an actress and singer who works primarily in Malayalam, Tamil, and Telugu films. She started her career as a child artist, in the French-Indian English movie Hanuman (1998), playing the younger sister to Tabu's character. She made her screen debut with the Kannada film 7 O'Clock (2006). Since then, she has given many hit movies, including Ala Modalaindi, Gallanthayyinde, Ishq and Malli Malli Idi Rani Roju. She made her Bollywood debut with Akshay Kumar and Vidya Balan starrer Mission Mangal. 

What do we know about Thiruchitrambalam?

Nithya starrer Thiruchitrambalam is a romantic comedy-drama, co-starring Dhanush. Directed by Mithran R. Jawahar, the movie revolves around Thiruchitrambalam (played by Dhanush), who lives with his father and grandfather. He blames the former for the loss of his mother and sister and is not on good terms with the latter. Meanwhile, his love life is not so successful. In the movie, Nithya played the role of Shobana, a childhood friend of Thiruchitrambalam. The movie earned positive reviews from the critics and grossed ₹94.25 crore in 18 days to become Dhanush's highest-earning film worldwide, beating his previous best Raanjhanaa.

Who is Manasi Parekh?

Manasi began her career with the TV, featuring in shows such as Kitni Mast Hai Zindagi, Kasautii Zindagii Kay, Kkavyanjali, Zindagi Ka Har Rang...Gulaal and more. While she was working for TV, she kept giving auditions for movie roles and bagged her first big screen project Leelai in 2011. Next, she was seen in the hit Bollywood movie Uri: The Surgical Strike, starring Vicky Kaushal and Yami Gautam. Since then, she has starred in six movies, including Kutch Express.

What do we know about Kutch Express?

 The Gujarati drama, directed by Viral Shah, co-starred Ratna Pathak Shah, Dharmendra Gohil, Darsheel Safary and Viraf Patel in lead roles. The movie revolves around how the journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step and explores love and life. Her role as Monghi was widely hailed by the critics and audience.