An exclusive interview with Richie Mehta, the director of Award-winning Hindi film 'Amal'

'Amal' by Richie Mehta could become Canada's official entry for the Best Foreign Film category at the next Oscars, according to media reports. 'Amal' has also become the most talked about film of the year with an Indian theme.

After winning the Best Independent Film of the latest Santa Barbara International Film Festival, 'Amal' took the grand jury prize for Best Narrative Feature at the Indian Film Festival of Los Angeles. Earlier, it won the Audience Award for best narrative at the AFI Dallas International Film Festival this year.

Mehta talks about his film and the decline of great Indian cinema: "Until the major filmmakers and movie stars in India decide to really invest the time and energy into their scripts and develop the projects properly -- this would mean spending years on scripts, overhauling them and passing them through the logic wringer yet still retaining the emotional core -- it won't happen," says Mehta in an exclusive interview with Pervaiz Alam