Hindi
Biopic on Punjabi poet Batlavi in anvil
MUMBAI: After the success of Paan Sing Tomar, biopics seem to be the flavour of the season. Yesterday we had a story that said Tigmanshu Dhulia was making a biopic of Begum Samru with Rani Mukerji.
It has now come to light that Mudassar Aziz is set to direct a biopic on the life of the renowned Punjabi poet Shiv Kumar Batalvi produced by Sunil Bohra.
The film will revolve around the poet’s troubled love life and will be helmed by Mudassar Aziz. Casting for the film is yet to take place. “Batalvi’s poems have been an inspiration for many and Batalvi Sahab is loved across borders, in India as well as Pakistan. He was one of the most romantic poets and what can be a bigger tribute than a film on his own love story that ended tragically though,” said Bohra in a statement.
Batalvi was the youngest recipient of Sahitya Akademy Award for his epic verse play, Loona. After he couldn’t marry the girl he loved deeply, he took to alcoholism.
Later, he married another girl chosen by his family, who he thought resembled his love. Batalvi died due to chronic alcoholism at 35.
The lyrics of Batalvi’s famous poem, Ajj Din Chadeya Tere Rang Varga, were used in a song from actor-producer Saif Ali Khan’s film, Love Aaj Kal.
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.
