Hindi
Interactive Television acquires media rights for Fun Cinemas
MUMBAI: Interactive Television has acquired the on-screen media rights for 11 Fun Cinemas multiplexes.
All advertising deals in any of the 11 Fun Cinemas screens will be routed though Interactive Television. The screens include Fun Cinemas screens in the NCR region, Panipat, Gulbarga, Lucknow and Chandigarh.
Says Interactive Television CEO Ajay Mehta, “We are extremely thrilled to have a reputed brand like Fun Cinemas on board amongst our already existing stream of established multiplex chains. With this partnership we hope to cater to our clients needs better and make their brand reach more effectively to up market audiences across the country.”
Says Fun Cinemas VP marketing Anand Vishal, ”With Interactive coming in as our onscreen partner, our multiplex chain stands to have 50 per cent market reach of top corporates in India. Interactive has been the strongest player in the category and we definitely want to make the most of it.”
For Interactive Television, a partnership with Fun Cinemas is the next step forward as the growth in the demand for in-cinema advertising is tremendous. Multiplexes have now started screening movies which appeal to platform as well as niche audiences which gives advertisers the option of selective screening. The growth of multiplexes is another factor which has contributed to the increase in the in-cinema advertising trend.
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.
