Border

Border is a 1997 Indian Hindi-language epic war film directed, produced and written by J. P. Dutta. Set during the Indo-Pakistani War of 1971, it is an adaptation of real life events that happened during the Battle of Longewala in 1971.[2] The film stars an ensemble cast of Jackie Shroff, Sunny Deol, Sunil Shetty, Akshaye Khanna, Sudesh Berry, Puneet Issar and Kulbhushan Kharbanda. Tabu, Raakhee, Pooja Bhatt and Sharbani Mukherjee feature in supporting roles.

Border was Dutta's dream project. He had begun working on the film's script in September 1995 and completed it by April 1996. The film was mostly shot in Bikaner, Rajasthan. Some parts were also filmed in Jodhpur.[3] One of the film's songs, "Sandese Aate Hai", sung by Sonu Nigam and Roop Kumar Rathod, became one of the most popular Hindi songs. The popularity of the song led several directors to offer Nigam for singing in their film's songs. Javed Akhtar wrote the lyrics of the songs while Anu Malik composed them. The song "Mere Dushman Mere Bhai" was sung by Hariharan.[4]

The film was released worldwide on 13 June 1997 with positive reviews from critics and garnered critical acclaim for its story, execution, scale, showing off the battle, direction, screenplay, performances and soundtrack.[5] It opened to strong box office results, had a final domestic net total of ₹ 394 million (US$5.2 million) and was declared an all-time blockbuster by Box Office India. It also became the highest-grossing Hindi film of 1997 in India, but if according to worldwide, it was the second highest-grossing film of the year behind Dil To Pagal Hai. Border grossed a worldwide total of ₹ 555.7 million (US$7.3 million).

The film won several awards at different award functions. It received 11 nominations at the 43rd Filmfare Awards, including Best Film, Best Actor for Sunny Deol, Best Supporting Actor for Suniel Shetty and Akshaye Khanna, and Best Supporting Actress for Raakhee, winning four including Best Male Debut for Akshaye Khanna. It also won three National Film Awards: Best Film on National Integration, Best Lyricist for Javed Akhtar, and Best Playback Singer (Male) for Hariharan.

On 15 August 2017, commemorating with the 70th Indian Independence Day,[6] the Indian Directorate of Film Festivals and Ministry of Defence jointly presented the Independence Day Film Festival, where the film was screened retrospectively for its continued cult classical popularity and completion of 20 years.