We wanted to wait till tonight before conveying our greetings to the "Lagaan"team and to Mr.Amir Khan.The Bosnian film did not defeat Lagaan;it won due to a set of coincidences,primary among which would be the recency of the Bosnian conflict-and therefore the theme's familiarity among -at least- the North American critics and viewers.

Lagaan should continue to be proud -as you have already mentioned-for promoting Indian movies as serious contenders on the global scene of arts and media. To rephrase Halle Berry-tonight's winner of the Best Actress award,the very presence of Lagaan tonight on the Awards roster,once again broke the barriers for all Bollywood movies to be taken seriously by sustaining the trend of making many more Lagaan type realistic/artistic portrayals of universal humane themes.

It is a serious challenge and we wish sincerely that the post-Lagaan Bollywood lives up to this challenge!