Hindi
Rajnikanth, Ramoji Rao, Priyanka Chopra, Ajay Devgn receive Padma honours
NEW DELHI: Iconic actor Rajnikanth, media and film magnate Ramoji Rao, and renowned classical vocalist Girija Devi have been named for the second highest civilian honour, the Padma Vibhushan, given for is awarded for exceptional and distinguished service.
Interestingly, the Padma Vibhushan awardees also include a posthumous award for the late Dhirubhai Ambani, who founded the Reliance Group and whose life inspired the film Guru starring Abhishek Bachchan with Aishwarya Rai Bachchan.
Veteran actor Anupam Kher and singer Udit Narayan are the only recipients from the entertainment industry apart from Heisnam Kanhaukak of the Padma Bhushan, given for distinguished service of high order. Indu Jain of Bennett Coleman & Co also received the Padma Bhushan.
The Padma Shri awardees for distinguished service from the entertainment field include directors Nila Madhab Panda (I want to be Kalam), S S Rajamouli (of Baahubali fame) and Madhur Bhandarkar; filmmaker Narendra Chandra Lal from the Andaman and Nicobar Islands; actors Ajay Devgn and Priyanka Chopra, ad guru Piyush Pandey; and a posthumous award to the late veteran actor Saeed Jaffrey.
In a statement issued from Bulgaria where he is currently shooting for his film, Shivaay, Devgn said, “I feel deeply humbled yet elated to receive such honour from my own country. The announcement today makes it special for me when I’m filming abroad for my new film Shivaay. I’d like to acknowledge that Padma Samman puts an extra responsibility on me and I promise to serve my country for as long as I can.”
In the field of sports, the Padma Bhushan awards are badminton ace Saina Nehwal, and tennis star Sania Mirza, while those getting Padma Shree are Deepika Kumari for archery from Jharkhand, and sports commentator Sushi Doshi.
In the field of music, the Padma Shree recepients are Pt Tulsidas Borkar of Goa for classical music; Dr Suma Ghosh of Uttar Pradesh for vocal singing; and Bhikhudan Gadhvi of Gujarat, Mamta Chandrakar of Chhatisgarh, and Bhojpuri singer Malini Awasthi of Uttar Pradesh for folk music, and late Prakash Chand Surana (posthumously) of Rajasthan for classical music.
The eminent dancer Yamini Krishnamurthy who has churned thousands of disciples gets the Padma Bhushan, dancer Pratibha Prahlad who founded the Delhi International Arts Festival, and Gulabi Sapera, who is a folk dancer from Rajasthan have been awarded the Padma Shree.
Renowned professor Pushpesh Pant; Kameshwar Brahma of Assam, and Jawaharlal Kaul of Jammu and Kashmir have also been awarded the Padma Shree.
Hindi
Remembering Gyan Sahay, the lens behind film, television and advertising
From a puppet rabbit selling poppadums to Hindi cinema, he framed it all.
MUMBAI: There are careers, and then there are canvases. Gyan Sahay, the veteran cinematographer, director, and producer who passed away on 10 March 2026 in Mumbai, had one of the latter. Over several decades in the Indian film and television industry, he turned lenses, lights, and the occasional puppet rabbit into something approaching art.
A graduate of the Film and Television Institute of India (FTII) in Pune, Sahay built his reputation as a director of photography across a career that stretched from the early 1970s all the way to the digital age. He was the kind of craftsman who understood that a well-composed shot is not merely a technical achievement but a quiet act of storytelling.
For most Indians of a certain age, however, Sahay will forever be the man behind the rabbit. His direction of the iconic long-running television commercial for Lijjat Papad, featuring its now-legendary puppet bunny, gave the country one of its most cheerfully persistent advertising images. It was the sort of work that sneaks into the national subconscious and takes up permanent residence.
His big-screen credits as cinematographer include Anokhi Pehchan (1972), Pagli (1974), Pas de Deux (1981), and Hum Farishte Nahin (1988). In 1999, he stepped behind a different kind of camera altogether, making his directorial debut with Sar Ankhon Par, a drama that featured Vikas Bhalla and Shruti Ulfat, with a cameo by Shah Rukh Khan for good measure.
On television, Sahay was particularly prized for his command of multi-camera production setups, a skill that made him a go-to technician for large-scale shows and reality programmes. In an industry that has never been especially patient with complexity, he was the calm hand on the rig.
In later life, Sahay turned teacher. He participated regularly in masterclasses and Digi-Talks, often hosted by organisations such as Bharatiya Chitra Sadhna, sharing hard-won wisdom on cinematography, the comedy of timing in a shot, and the sweeping changes brought by the shift from celluloid to digital. He was also said to have been involved in a project concerning a biographical film on Infosys co-founder N.R. Narayana Murthy.
Tributes from the film industry poured in following the news of his passing, with colleagues remembering him as a senior cameraman who served as a rare bridge between two entirely different eras of Indian cinema. That is, perhaps, the finest thing one can say of any craftsman: he kept up, and he brought others along with him.
