Happy 'The Good Road' selected for Oscars: Ramesh Sippy

Filmmaker Ramesh Sippy supports the selection of Gyan Correa's Gujarati film "The Good Road" as India's official entry for the Oscars and expects support from the film fraternity.

The movie left behind other contenders like "The Lunchbox", "Bhaag Milkha Bhaag", "English Vinglish", "Vishwaroop", Malayalam film "Celluloid" and Bengali film "Shabdo".

Sippy, director of the cult film "Sholay" and chairman of the National Film Development Corporation of India (NFDC), believes that the journey of Indian Cinema on the global map in recent years has been extremely encouraging.

"With three diverse and brilliant films, which NFDC proudly associates with, 'Bhaag Milkha Bhaag', 'The Lunchbox', and 'The Good Road', helmed by talented directors Rakeysh Omprakash Mehra, Ritesh Batra and Gyan Correa, in the running for India's official Oscar selection race, we truly celebrated the cinema of India at an international level, having successfully fulfilled our mandate of promoting and supporting Indian cinema," Sippy said in a statement.

"A unique, small and beautiful film, we are happy that 'The Good Road' has been selected as India's official entry to the Academy Awards and look forward to the support of the film fraternity of India as also of all Indians in our journey," he added.