Awards for the disabled?

The Oscars this year for Best Actor and Best Actress have gone to Eddy Redmayne for The Theory Of Everything and to Julianne Moore for Still Alice respectively for portraying extraordinary disabilities. Here's looking at other extraordinary portrayals of physical or psychological disability.

Daniel Day-Lewis in My Left Foot: Won an Oscar for his performance as the cerebral palsy-afflicted Christy Brown. Regarded by many as the most accomplished portrayal of physical disability ever.

Marleee Matlin in Children Of A Lesser God: Marlee Matlin won the Oscar for her performance as a deaf woman. Incidentally Marlee is aurally impaired in real life.

Bradley Cooper in Silver Linings Playbook: Though he missed the Oscar, Cooper was extraordinary as a man grappling with normal life after being institutionalized for Bipolar Disorder.

Dustin Hoffman in Rain Man: Bagged the Oscar for playing Raymond, the autistic half-brother to the selfish Tom Cruise. Everyone loved this Raymond.

Tom Hanks In Forrest Gump: As the mentally challenged Forrest Gump, Hanks won the richly deserved Oscar.

Russell Crowe in A Beautiful Mind: Portrayed the brilliant schizophrenic mathematician John Forbes Nash and rightful walked away with the Oscar.

Shah Rukh Khan in My Name Is Khan: A performance where the Khan ceased to be Raj or Rahul. We saw only the autistic Khan character in front of us.

Rajesh Khanna in Khamoshi: After a break-up, Rajesh Khanna comes to a mental asylum to be cured by nurse Waheeda Rehman who has the hots for him. The performance was remarkably controlled... no hysterical laughter, no nervous twitches or a pointed giggle... it was all amazingly smooth-sailing.

Smita Patil in Arth: Hiccuping hysterically, wheezing in anguished nervousness, screaming as she falls dangerously into dementia, Smita was a sight in Arth!

Raakhee in Dacait: As a woman who suffers a complete nervous breakdown after she's incessantly tortured by the villains Raakhee was scarily real in this brilliant Rahul Rawail film. The fear and later the void in the actress' eyes was palpable.

Jaya Bhaduri and Sanjeev Kumar in Koshish: They were amazingly real as a deaf-and-mute couple trying to lead a normal life. Wonder why only Sanjeev was rewarded with the National award when Jaya was every bit as brilliant, if not better.

Salman Khan in Tere Naam: You could doubt the medical authenticity of this cock-and-bull story. But the angst in Khan's eyes as he lapsed in a dungeon-styled dementia (chains in the hands and feet) and the pain of unrequited love stayed with you A truly bravura performance that deserved a lot more recognition.

Farida Jalal in Bobby: An underrated gem of a performance. As an adult with an under-developed IQ, desperate to latch on to anyone who would marry her, Farida was poignant and cruelly funny.

Ayesha Kapoor in Black: Though she wasn't mentally challenged, her acute isolation caused by her deafness and muteness made little Ayesha's character a portrait of volatile dysfunctionalism. The little girl gave what can comfortably be called the best performance by a child.

Kamal Haasan in Abhay: If you haven't seen the Tamilian maverick do the psycho in this psychedelic thriller, you haven't really watched an actor go over the edge without going over-the-top. Kamal Haasan walked that thin dread line without losing hold of the character's heart-ripping roots.

Sridevi in Sadma: As the child-woman suffering from amnesia, Sridevi pouted preened and pirouetted without looking monstrously hammy. Her performance was cute endearing heartwarming and utterly authentic.

Konkona Sen-Sharma in 15 Park Avenue: If Sridevi in Sadma was cute, Konkona is acute. As a girl slipping and sliding into total mental collapse, Konkona comes into her own. Her understanding of the nature of schizophrenia is so acute, you wonder if she's 'acting' for a camera or assuming a personality disorder that comes from within her. This is one split personality that doesn't have you in splits. The portrait of schizophrenia raises harrowing recollections of Smita in Arth. Could Shabana's presence in both films be the creative catalyst?

Sanjeev Kumar in Khilona: In this bizarre melodrama about a kothewali (Mumtaz)'s efforts to wean a 'paagal' (that's how mentally disturbed souls were known in our past movies) away from insanity had Sanjeev Kumar giving a broad but clenched performance. In scenes where he was locked up in a room, he behaved like King Kong on steroids threatening to break the window grill and leap at his lady love.

Priyanka Chopra in Barfi: As the autistic Jhilmil in Anurag Basu's gentle and joyful new film, Priyanka Chopra brings to her role, the kind of elegant edginess that very few actors in India have managed while playing psychologically special human beings. Priyanka strips her persona of all glamorous vanity, and outstrips even Ranbir Kapoor who is outstanding in his right, thereby proving herself once again to be the best actress in the post-Sridevi generation.

Hrithik Roshan in Koi...Mil Gaya: Though he didn't play a psychologically-challenged character, Hrithik proved himself one of the finest actors of the pre- and post- Bachchan era, playing the autistic child-man in his dad's Koi... Mil Gaya.