Kannada filmmaker Hemanth Rao slams IIFA, says 'extremely disrespectful'

Kannada director Hemanth Rao had a fairly terrible experience at the IIFA Awards this year. He complained that despite being invited and made to wait until 3 a.m., he was not handed an award. The director described the episode as "extremely disrespectful" and stated that he was furious not because he did not get an award but because his time had been wasted.

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Rao directed the 2023 hit Sapta Saagaradaache Ello and resorted to Instagram to strike out at IIFA. "The whole IIFA experience was such a massive inconvenience and extremely disrespectful. I’ve been in this business for over a decade and this wasn't my first stint at award shows. Its always been a case where the winners are flown in and hosted for the event. For context, I was sat till 3 AM in the morning only to realize there was no award. The same happened to my Music Director: Charan Raj," he wrote.

Small detail about this year's #IIFAawards2024. pic.twitter.com/7nJHWiPHEv

— Hemanth M Rao (@hemanthrao11) September 29, 2024

He went on to say, "It's your award. You can give it to whoever you want to. That's your choice!! I haven’t won MANY awards and haven't lost sleep over it, so these grapes aren't sour. If all the other nominees were invited and one winner emerged out of it. I wouldn't bother getting irritated. Also, the format this year was just to hand out the award. The nominees weren’t even mentioned."

• Hemanth Rao