Hindi
‘A Wedding Gift’ is set for May release
NEW DELHI: ‘A Wedding Gift‘ is a film that dares to question Section 498A of the Indian Penal Code to show how it can be misused by anyone to file a false dowry case.
Made under the banner of Aliya Productions, the film is expected to be released next month. The music has been composed by Ray & Brotherhood.
Veteran actor Farida Jalal told indiantelevision.com that she had agreed to act in the film ‘498A – A Wedding Gift’ when its producer-director Suhaib Ilyasi related a brief synopsis, because she felt this was a malaise that should be highlighted.
Made on a modest budget of Rs 50 million, the film also stars Alok Nath, Sushma Seth, Reema Lagoo, Colgate Ad boy Harsh Nagar, Supriya Karnik, Deepak Tijori, and the new face from Delhi Shrishti Gautam, apart from a look-alike of Prime Minister Manmohan Singh – Gurmeet Singh, a 65-year-old Jangpura resident who said he is often asked to pose for photos as he looks like Dr Singh.
Veteran ghazal singer Ghulam Ali has rendered a patriotic song and has also acted in the film. “What is so surprising in this? I found the wordings of the song beautiful, music touched me and hence I agreed to sing. This song in any case can be for any country. It’s a song dedicated to one’s own watan. When I was asked to perform on screen, I was initially skeptical but later got into the spirit of it”.
‘And why not,” he asked, adding, “India and Pakistan were one country. There were two brothers till siyasat played its dirty game by separating them and creating a siyasi border in 1947.”
Ilyasi, who had earlier gained fame as the maker of India’s first crime show that exposed real criminals, ‘India’s Most Wanted’ on Doordarshan leading to many arrests, appeared before the Committee of Petitions of the Rajya Sabha go give for his views on Section 498A of the Indian Penal Code.
Ilyasi was asked to give suggestions since his film deals with the freedom that this section gives for any woman or her kin to file false cases against a husband or his family.
The Committee is examining amendments in Section 498A of the Indian Penal Code, 1860. Parliament is considering amending the law after having received numerous complaints from the civil society about misuse of the same.
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.
