Hindi
Toilet — Ek Prem Katha may spring a surprise
MUMBAI: Unlikely as it may seem, Akshay Kumar’s Toilet Ek Prem Katha may be on its way to spring a surprise at the box office. In fact, the process started from day two after its release as the film’s collections took huge jump on Saturday followed by another leap on Sunday.
The film, which is meant to be a love story about an overage small town UP native, Akshay Kumar, mildly uncouth but street smart, and, Bhumi Pednekar, an educated younger girl up to date with the trends, takes a turn to propagate the need for personal toilets for every home.
The film promotes the prime minister Narendra Modi’s campaign against open defecating. The last 50 minutes of the film are meant to educate and inform the people, mainly of the hinterland, about privacy for women when it comes to call of nature.
That the film has gradually found favour with the multiplex audience can be attributed to the popularity of Akshay Kumar. He has been sincere and worked hard to promote the purpose of the film.
*Most recent films, including big star films like Tubelight and Jab Harry Met Sejal, have met with poor response with below par opening day collection. Toilet Ek Prem Katha did quite well on that count collecting over almost Rs 120 million on day one despite its theme.
The film enjoyed the advantage of a longer weekend but, while most films fail to rise on the Saturday following its opening day, Toilet Ek Prem Katha, took a massive leap with the collection jumping to Rs 170 million. The figures on Sunday were even better as the film collected over Rs 210 million to end its opening weekend with an impressive Rs 511 million. Things can get only better with a couple of more public holidays to follow during the week.
The film needs to reach its target of approx Rs 1.25 billion.
*Jab Harry Met Sejal faces rejection from day one. Having collected 53.7 crore in its first week, it slides badly as its week two takes off. The film’s shows had to be cancelled for lack of audience at many screens. The film manages to add Rs 38 million in its second week to take its two week total to Rs 575 million.
*Mubarakan collected Rs 464 million over its first two weeks has collected about Rs 35 million in its third week to take its three week tally to Rs 499 million.
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.
