Hindi
Activities of NRI Film Producers Association kick starts at Pravasi Bharatiya Divas
MUMBAI: Non Resident Indian Producers Association (NRIPA) on Wednesday kick started its journey in making films at the Pravasi Bharatiya Divas conference in Kochi.
All this was at the behest of renowned filmmaker and president of NRIPA Sohan Roy who gained international acceptance and recognition by his film DAM 999. NRIPA has been formed with an aim to be the most useful and efficient association in the film industry by promoting new generation film makers and nurturing a fresh culture within the industry.
Talking at the launch, Roy said, “As a producer of my first project, I have learnt that making films in India provides a big heap of opportunity for any producer to make money but I also learnt the hard fact that the most first timers don‘t make it into the profit zone purely because of their ignorance.
You will also be surprised to know the reality that the largest film producing nation in the world has the least presence in international film circuits. Indian films rarely make attempts to make their presence felt at the 40 internationally recognized film marketing zones. This is purely because of the ignorance about the opportunities existing outside. With NRIPA I would like to obliterate this ignorance by giving my fellow film makers the right guidance.”
NRIPA has launched with the major objective of bringing enthusiastic potential NRI producers to invest in the brand called ‘Film India‘ and to ensure profitable returns to the investment.
Saint Dracula 3D the world‘s first 3D Dracula movie is the first project under NRIPA. It has already made it into the Oscar selections in different categories this year with the help of NRIPA.
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.
