Hindi
Salman Khan defies Eid release with Dabaang 2 releasing during Christmas this year
MUMBAI: Since the last couple of years, Salman Khan‘s films have been releasing around Eid. The exercise started with Wanted (2010), Dabangg (2010), Ready (2011) Bodyguard (2011) and the latest Ek Tha Tiger.
But not any more. His next Dabangg 2 is set for a Christmas release. It may be remembered that 23 years ago his first-ever blockbuster Maine Pyar Kiya released on 29 December, 1989. Dabangg 2 is set to hit theatres on 21 December.
It is said that Salman consciously decided to break the myth surrounding his Eid superstition. He believes that the content of Dabangg 2 is even better than that of the original, hence this is a play to defy the Eid release myth.
Said producer Arbaaz Khan in a statement, "There are four-five vital release periods in a year, which are important for any big film. Since our film will be ready by the year-end, we decided to release it during the Christmas period."
The sequel while retaining its lead pair Salman Khan and Sonakshi Sinha, has replaced Sonu Sood with Prakash Raj as the baddie chief.
The original was directed by Abhinav Kashyap, and was a big turning point in Salman‘s box-office fortune. Actor-turned-producer Arbaaz Khan has now taken the director‘s seat.
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.
