Interesting Facts About Mother India, The First Indian Movie To Be Nominated At The Oscars (Part I)

It was the first Indian movie that got nominated for the Academy Award in 1957.

Directed by Mehboob Khan and featuring Nargis and Sunil Dutt with Raj Kumar in a cameo, Mother India is regarded as one of the greatest movies ever made not only in Bollywood but the whole Indian cinema. It was the first Indian movie that got nominated for the Academy Award in 1957.

Nargis who was a big star then got applauded a lot for her performance and many critics believed that after Mother India, there was no need for Nargis to do more movies because the pinnacle she reached in the movie can’t even be matched by her also. We list down interesting facts about the movie Mother India.

It was a Remake 

Don’t get alarmed by the word remake but Mother India was a remake of Mehboob Khan’s own movie Aurat. 

Mehboob Khan made a movie Aurat in 1940 which did decent business at that time, but later during the 1950s, Mehboob Khan wanted to remake Aurat on a lavish level with big names. He signed Nargis for the lead role and Rajkumar in a cameo as his husband. It featured Sunil Dutt and Rajendra Kumar as her sons who were comparatively new actors then. The core of the movie was the same as Aurat but many things were changed in the script of the movie.

First Indian Movie to get Nominated at the Oscars

Though India sent many movies before also competing in the Best Foreign Language Film at the Oscars, Mother India was the first Indian movie to get a nomination in that category. 

India sent Mother India to compete for the Best Foreign Language movie at the Academy Awards and it became the first Indian movie that got nominated at the Academy Awards. Only two more movies Salaam Bombay (1988) and Lagaan (2000) got nominations in the category of Best Foreign Language movie at the Academy Awards. Mother India became quite famous during the screenings and lost to Federico Fellini's Nights of Cabiria by only one vote.

Title of The Movie

There is a reason the name Mother India was chosen as the title of the movie.

Katherine Mayo, an American author wrote a book titled Mother India in 1927 where she criticized Indian culture, especially the way Indian women lead their lives. The book was criticized a lot for its false narrative. Mehboob Khan kept the title Mother India to confront Katherine Mayo’s book and show what Indian women actually are. He believed that the title Mother India represents the strength of Indian women.