Hindi
Salman Khan turns 25 in Bollywood
Salman Khan is one of India’s most influential and bankable stars, and on Thursday this big screen icon completed his silver jubilee in the Hindi film industry.
Salman Khan’s first film was a family drama that released on 22 August, 1988. The film, Biwi Ho Toh Aisi also starred Rekha and Farooq Shaikh with Salman in a supporting role as Shaikh’s younger brother. Although the film didn’t do well commercially, it was the stepping stone for Salman to make his mark on the silver screen as its reigning blockbuster king.
Just a year later, Salman starred in Maine Pyar Kiya as the lead actor and the Indian audience took notice of his charisma and star power. In the years to come Salman has acted in some of Bollywood’s biggest blockbusters and critically acclaimed films. For his work in these films he has been nominated and won many prestigious awards for excellence in Indian cinema, including Film Fare Awards and Screen Awards.
In addition to his success with movies, Salman Khan is also known for his high profile romantic relationships, most notably with Aishwarya Rai and Katrina Kaif. He is also heavy into philanthropy taking part in various charitable organisations, as well as starting his own – Being Human. Being Human is a charity that sells T-shirts and uses the proceeds to help under privileged children.
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.
