Hindi
Sidharth Malhotra to travel time in his next film
MUMBAI: Karan Johar’s student of the year Sidharth Malhotra is already a hit among the ‘cinemagoers.’ After back to back hits like Hasee Toh Phasee and Ek Villain, the actor has become one of the most successful newcomers in the industry. As he prepares to take on Akshay Kumar in the boxing ring in Karan Malhotra’s Brothers, a remake of ‘Warriors’ and cloak himself as a vigilante superhero in Vikramaditya Motwane’s Bhavesh Joshi, Sidharth Malhotra has another interesting movie in his bag.
According to media reports, Farhan Akhtar and Ritesh Sidhwani has roped in Sidharth Malhotra to act in their next film which will be co-produced by the actor’s mentor Karan Johar. The movie was initially offered to Aamir Khan but the actor and the studio failed to agree on the remuneration and other commercial clauses.
The yet untitled film is said to be a love story with a twist, about a time-traveller, with a romance which spans across timelines and will be directed by debutante Nitya Mehra.
Confirming the news to media Sidhwani said, “Yes, Sidharth is on board and Karan too. Karan is a good friend and we’ve been talking about collaborating on a film for quite some time now. It was a conversation with the film’s hero which eventually brought Karan onboard. He heard about this film from Sid and asked us for the script. He loved it so much that he said he would be happy to get involved in any capacity. Farhan and I have never co-produced before, Karan is our first partner.”
The film is expected to go on floors by April 2015, the leading lady will be locked in another four-five days.
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.
