Kolkata-born actress Anasuya Sengupta became the first Indian to win an acting award at the Cannes Film Festival on Friday for her performance in Bulgarian director Constantin Bojanov's The Shameless.

The 37-year-old bagged the best actress award in the Un Certain Regard category.

Anasuya has previously worked in Anjan Dutt’s Madly Bangalee (2009). She also served as the production designer for Sanjeev Sharma’s Saat Uchakkey (2016) and Srijit Mukherji's Forget Me Not in Netflix's 2021 anthology Ray. She also worked in Netflix’s Masaba Masaba.

In The Shameless, she portrays Renuka, a drifter seeking refuge in a northern Indian community of sex workers after escaping Delhi, where she is wanted for murder. The film delves into Renuka's love affair with a teenager named Devika, played by Omara Shetty.

In other awards, Guan Hu's Black Dog won the top prize in the Un Certain Regard section. The jury prize was awarded to The Story of Souleymane by Boris Lojkine. The best director award was shared by Roberto Minervini for The Damned and Rungano Nyoni for On Becoming A Guinea Fowl. Abou Sangare took home the best actor award for his role in The Story of Souleymane, and Louise Courvoisier’s Vingt Dieux received the youth award.

This year's Un Certain Regard selection featured 18 films. The jury, led by Canadian actor, director, screenwriter, and producer Xavier Dolan, included French-Senegalese screenwriter and director Maïmouna Doucouré; Moroccan director, screenwriter, and producer Asmae El Moudir; German-Luxembourg actress Vicky Krieps; and American film critic, director, and writer Todd McCarthy.