By Biswamoy Mukherjee Kolkata, May 12 (UNI) The legacy of Bengali film industry goes on with aplomb as new age directors and artists are carving a niche for themselves in the national platform. Toeing the footsteps of stalwarts of yore like Ritwik Ghatak, Oscar-winning Satyajit Ray, Mrinal Sen and Rituporno Ghosh, Bengali film industry showed its prowess by winning awards in four categories in the 64th National Film Awards for the year 2016, which were announced recently. Megastar Amitabh Bachchan starrer filmmaker Shoojit Sircar’s film ‘Pink’ won the National award for being the Best Film on Social Issues. The film was hailed a commercial and critical success in the box office. After winning the National Award, the filmmaker Shoojit expressed his gratitude as he said, “I want to thank my team, my writer, Mr Bachchan and the whole cast and crew. It is my fourth consecutive year at the National Awards so I am very happy.” Renowned director Kaushik Ganguly won his third National Award for the film ‘Bisorjon’ in the Best Bengali film category. The film is about a cross border love story starring Abir Chatterjee and Bangladeshi actress Jaya Ahsan. Emaan Chakraborty won the Best Playback Singer (Female) award for the song ‘Tumi Jake Bhalobasho’ from the film ‘Praktan’ which was written by Composer-lyricist Anupam Roy who bagged the Best Lyrics award for the same. From the golden era of Satyajit Ray to a phase of commercial and masala films, and more recently the co-existence of art and commerce, the Bangla film industry has undergone a sea change in the last few years, thanks to the advent of independent film making, international collaborations, organic marketing and innovative distribution. The chequered history of Bengali cinema, which spans roughly a century, has many notable triumphs. The period between the ‘50s and the ‘70s were probably the Golden Era of the Bengali film industry. The golden period began with Satyajit Ray's Pather Panchali (1955), which was awarded Best Human Document at Cannes. After that, Bengali films frequently appeared in international film festivals for several decades and continue to do so. This allowed Bengali filmmakers to reach a global audience. MORE UNI BM SJC