Hindi
Amitabh Bachchan unveils Mahatma Gandhi’s statue in London
NEW DELHI: Amitabh Bachchan unveiled a statue of Mahatma Gandhi at Parliament Square in London in the presence of British Prime Minister David Cameron and Finance Minister Arun Jaitley. Bachchan said he was honoured, humbled and felt touched.
Bachchan also read out an excerpt from Gandhi’s The World of Tomorrow on the occasion at the unveiling over the weekend. Gopal Gandhi, grandson of the Mahatma, was also present, apart from Lord Meghnad Desai and his wife.
In a message on Twitter, Bachchan later said the respect and dignity given to him was so humbling. Prior to the unveiling, he described the forthcoming event as ‘nerve trepidation.’
“A historic moment and a historic presence. I am honoured and humbled. I am so touched and honoured to have been given this pride of place at this most prestigious occasion,” Bachchan wrote on his official blog srbachchan.tumblr.com.
The statue is the result of efforts of the Gandhi Statue Memorial Trust (London) and its trustee Lord Meghnad Desai. The large size nine foot bronze statue of Mahatma Gandhi has been made by British sculptor Philip Jackson, who depicted it from Gandhi’s photographs wrapped in a shawl to shield himself from London’s cold during his visit to 10 Downing Street, London, in 1931 as the leader of Indian National Movement.
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.
