IIFA 2017: 'Ae Dil Hai Mushkil' leads with 8 nominations

The 18th edition of the 2017 IIFA Awards is among the most coveted and highly anticipated awards celebrations that honour the very best of Indian Cinema with the highest level of achievement seen through the glamorous IIFA statuette.

Today, the International Indian Film Academy (IIFA) Awards announced the list of nominations in the popular category.

Leading the race with a whopping eight nominations in the popular categories along with Best Picture is 'Ae DIl Hai Mushkil' followed by the biopic of the former Indian cricket skipper- 'M.S. Dhoni: The Untold Story' bagging seven nominations in popular categories including the Best Picture.

The other contenders for Best Picture are 'Neerja', 'Pink', 'Sultan' and 'Udta Punjab'.

 

Andre Timmins, director- Wizcraft International, the producers and creators of the IIFA movement, shared, "It is amazing to see the progress that the IIFA Festival New York has seen in the past few months as we prepare for our biggest IIFA Awards ever. Featuring a mega star line up for IIFA Rocks and IIFA Awards we will be creating entertainment like never seen before. We are thankful for so many of the industry that turned out to vote for the nominated films and people involved. It now remains for the global online voting to begin for the popular category awards to be determined. The 2017 IIFA Awards is going to be a night not to be missed and exciting times to see who finally wins those highly coveted IIFA Awards. The demand for tickets has been tremendous and I would simply advise IIFA fans to grab the hotly sought-after tickets while you still can on iifa.com or ticketmaster.com."

Speaking of the association with IIFA, R. S Kalsi, executive director, Marketing & Sales, Maruti Suzuki said, "We are delighted to associate with NEXA IIFA Awards 2017 for the third consecutive year. This year we will showcase how NEXA is at the forefront of bringing innovation & delivering outstanding experiences. NEXA is not just an automotive brand but also a lifestyle brand. NEXA is all about newer and premium experiences, just like IIFA which builds lifetime experiences and felicitates excellence in Indian cinema at a global stage."

The full list of nominations is:

BEST PICTURE

Ae Dil Hai Mushkil - Karan Johar, Hiroo Yash Johar & Apoorva Mehta

M.S.Dhoni - Fox Star Studios, Arun Pandey(Inspired Entertainment)

Neerja - Fox Star Studios, Bling Unplugged

Pink - Rashmi Sharma, Ronnie Lahiri, Sheel Kumar

Sultan - Aditya Chopra

Udta Punjab - Shobha Kapoor, Ekta Kapoor, Sameer Nair, Aman Gill, Vikas Bahl, Vikramaditya Motwane & Anurag Kashyap

BEST STORY

Kapoor & Sons - Ayesha Devitre Dhillon, Shakun Batra

Neerja - Saiwyn Quadras

Pink - Ritesh Shah, Aniruddha Roy Chowdhury, Shoojit Sircar

BEST DIRECTION

Karan Johar - Ae Dil Hai Mushkil

Neeraj Pandey- M.S.Dhoni

Ram Madhvani - Neerja

Aniruddha Roy Chowdhury - Pink

Ali Abbas Zafar - Sultan

Abhishek Chaubey - Udta Punjab

BEST ACTOR IN A LEADING ROLE (MALE)

Shahid Kapoor - Udta Punjab

Ranbir Kapoor - Ae Dil Hai Mushkil

Shah Rukh Khan - Fan

Sushant Singh Rajput - M.S.Dhoni

Amitabh Bachchan - Pink

Salman Khan - Sultan

BEST ACTOR IN A LEADING ROLE (FEMALE)

Anushka Sharma - Ae Dil Hai Mushkil

Alia Bhatt - Dear Zindagi

Sonam Kapoor - Neerja

Taapsee Pannu - Pink

Alia Bhatt - Udta Punjab

MUSIC DIRECTION

Pritam - Ae Dil Hai Mushkil

Amaal Malik & Rochak Kohli - M.S.Dhoni

Amit Trivedi - Udta Punjab

BEST LYRICIST

Amitabh Bhattacharya - Channa Mereya, Ae Dil Hai Mushkil

Gulzar - Aave re Hitchki, Mirzya

Tanveer Ghazi - Tu Chal, Pink

BEST PLAYBACK SINGER (MALE)

Arijit Singh - Channa Mereya, Ae Dil Hai Mushkil

Amit Mishra - Bulleya, Ae Dil Hai Mushkil

Diljit Dosanjh - Ikk Kudi ( reprise ), Udta Punjab

Armaan Malik - Besabriyaan, MS. Dhoni

BEST PLAYBACK SINGER (FEMALE)

Kanika Kapoor - Da Da Dasse, Udta Punjab

Neha Bhasin - Jag Ghoomeya, Sultan

Tulsi Kumar - Soch Na Sake, Airlift

BEST ACTOR IN A NEGATIVE ROLE

Neill Nitin Mukesh - Wazir

Shah Rukh Khan - Fan

Jim Sarbh - Neerja

BEST SUPPORTING ACTOR (MALE)

Rajat Kapoor - Kapoor & Sons

Rajkumar Rao - Aligarh

Rishi Kapoor - Kapoor & Sons

Anupam Kher - M.S.Dhoni

Amitabh Bachchan - Wazir

BEST SUPPORTING ACTOR (FEMALE)

Shabana Azmi - Neerja

Andrea Tariang - Pink

Ratna Pathak Shah - Kapoor & Sons

Disha Patani - M.S.Dhoni

Richa Chadha - Sarbjit

The award ceremony will take place at the iconic MetLife Stadium on the 14th and 15th of July.

IIFA Global Voting goes LIVE on May 20 till June 18.

Nexa IIFA Awards will air exclusively on Colors TV.