Mahershala Ali in 'Moonlight'- first Muslim to win an Oscar

Raise the toast! It is a double celebration for Mahershala Ali.

After announcing the birth of his first child, with wife Amatus Sami-Karim two days back, Ali now bags the golden Statuette at the 89th Academy Awards in the 'Actor in a supporting role' category for 'Moonlight.'

With this, he becomes the first Muslim actor to win an Oscar ever.

"I just want to thank [my wife] for being such a soldier through this process and carrying me through it all," said the 43-year-old actor, while accepting the trophy on stage.

'Moonlight,' which also bagged the 'Best Movie' trophy, sees Ali, portraying a Cuban-born drug dealer, living in Miami, who becomes a surrogate father to a bullied youngster and tries to instill confidence in him.

 

Looks like, Oscars, this year, has completely geared up to counter the 'Oscar-so-white' controversy, which went on in the past years.

On a related note, the 'House of Cards' actor confirmed the news of the birth of his baby girl Bari Najma, on Instagram, with a picture of his wife cuddling the tiny tot, clicked from the back side.

The snap was captioned, "Bari (Bar-ee) Najma Ali 2/22/17 #pisces.