Hindi
Whistling Woods & Neeta Lulla to set up a School of Fashion
MUMBAI: Producer – director Subhash Ghai and fashion designer Neeta Lulla have joined hands to launch a fashion school, which will be called Whistling Woods – Neeta Lulla School of Fashion (WWNL).
Spearheaded academically by Lulla and featuring a guest faculty of fashion industry greats, WWNL aims to create the next generation of fashion designers and fashion industry professionals. WWNL will commence classes in August with admissions opening in the second week of May.
Ghai said, "Fashion has always played an integral role in films. Through fashion, characters come alive before the camera. Neeta Lulla who has spent so many years with the industry has continually strived to grow the field of fashion, both within the film industry and outside of it. I‘m delighted that Whistling Woods is partnering with her to create the Whistling Woods – Neeta Lulla School of Fashion."
Courses run will be a Diploma in Fashion Design (one year) and an Advanced Diploma in Fashion Design (two years). The WWNL School of Fashion will also be bridging the gap between industry and academia by bringing on board an advisory board consisting of industry specialists, guest and visiting faculty from the industry. The institute also plans to invite globally renowned teachers from Europe‘s finest fashion schools and the global fashion industry to deliver guest lectures.
Lulla added, "When I started out in the fashion industry, there were limited options available within fashion education in India but today, it gives me great pride to announce our school of fashion that will train fashion aspirants to excel at the highest levels. I could not see a better fit than Whistling Woods to partner with and to launch a structured comprehensive School of Fashion and I‘m thrilled to be working with Subhashji and his institute for the same."
Whistling Woods International president Meghna Ghai-Puri said, "We‘re very excited to be launching the fashion space. This is something we‘ve wanted to do for a long time and we couldn‘t have found a better partner. Whistling Woods has always been the best platform for industry aspirants. With the launch of the Whistling Woods – Neeta Lulla School of Fashion, we are reinforcing our commitment to developing local talent in all spheres of the thriving Indian film industry."
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.
