Ganapathi Venkataramana Iyer 3 September 1917 21 December 2003 popularly known as G V Iyer was a wellknown Indian film director and actor He was nicknamed Kannada Bheeshma and was the only person who made movies in Sanskrit His movie Adi Shankaracharya 1983 won four National Film Award including Best Film Best Screenplay Best Cinematography and Best Audiography His films were well known for their spiritual themes He was born in 1917 in Nanjanagud in Mysore district of Karnataka state in South India His most critically acclaimed films Bhagavad Gita 1993 which won the National Film Award for Best Feature Film and was nominated for Best Film at the Bogotá Film Festival And Swami Vivekananda 1998 Mithun Chakraborty won national award for Best Supporting Actor