Hindi
Raja Harishchandra now available on DVD
MUMBAI: Film buffs fond of old classics can now watch the country‘s first silent film Raja Harishchandra on DVD.
Produced by Dadasaheb Phalke, the film was first exhibited on 3 May 1913, is now being distributed in the DVD format by the city-based National Film Archives of India (NFAI), according to its director Prashant Pathrabe.
“The decision to make DVDs of the silent movies was taken in view of a long felt need to reach the general masses, who are interested in having an access to the historically significant work of pioneers of Indian cinema,” Pathrabe said in a statement.
Along with the Phalke film, five other silent films, that marked the beginning of the Indian film industry, would also be now available in DVD format.
Elaborating on the significance of the first film, produced by the father of Indian cinema, Pathrabe said, “Raja Harishchandra was made by Phalke overcoming all odds and financial difficulties and also social stigma attached to films a century ago. He was almost ex-communicated (in Maharashtra). He was unable to seek a heroine for his film and the female characters were enacted by men. One Salunke played the female role of Taramati in this mythological film.”
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.
