Seventy-two years and it's never left Delhi. Until now.

The 72nd National Film Awards ceremony will be held in Kevadia, Gujarat, on September 22, officials said, marking the first time in the award's history that the function moves out of the capital. President Droupadi Murmu will present the honours, as she has in previous years, just not in the room everyone expects.

That room is Vigyan Bhawan, which has hosted the ceremony since the very first National Awards in 1954. Kevadia breaks the run entirely. The town has since been renamed Ekta Nagar and is best known as home to the Statue of Unity, the 597-foot tribute to Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel that Prime Minister Narendra Modi inaugurated back in 2018. It's a deliberate change of address, and one that trades a government auditorium for a site built specifically as a national symbol.

The awards themselves, announced in July in Delhi, cover Indian cinema from 2024, and the list reads like a proper cross-industry year. Article 370 took Best Feature Film, with Yami Gautam named Best Actress for it. Best Actor is a split decision this time: Mammootty for Bramayugam and Kartik Aaryan for Chandu Champion share the honour, which doesn't happen often. Randeep Hooda picked up Best Debut Director for Swatantrya Veer Savarkar, his biopic on Vinayak Damodar Savarkar, adding a filmmaking award to an already busy year for him as an actor-director.

The bigger regional wins matter too. Kalki 2898 AD, Nag Ashwin's science-fiction epic with Prabhas, Deepika Padukone, Amitabh Bachchan and Kamal Haasan, gets Best Popular Film Providing Wholesome Entertainment. Captain Miller, Arun Matheswaran's Dhanush-led Tamil film, is Best Feature Film Promoting National, Social and Environmental Values. And Rajkumar Periasamy wins Best Director for Amaran, the war biopic that had a strong theatrical run of its own last year.

Why Kevadia, specifically, hasn't been spelled out beyond the obvious optics of a national ceremony at a national monument. Delhi has never really had competition for this event, so the move is being read as much as a statement as a scheduling change. Whether it stays there next year or swings back to Vigyan Bhawan is anyone's guess right now.

What's confirmed is the date. September 22, Kevadia, President Murmu presiding. Winners from Article 370 to Kalki 2898 AD to Bramayugam will all be in the room, and for the first time in 72 years, that room won't be in Delhi.