Hindi
UTV acquires filming rights of Chetan Bhagat’s Revolution 2020
MUMBAI: UTV Motion Pictures has acquired the filming rights of Chetan Bhagat‘s latest fiction novel Revolution 2020.
UTV said that the novel will be turned into an epic drama with strong roles for the lead cast. The book has great roles for its key protagonists, as it narrates the story of three central characters – Gopal, Raghav and Aarti whose destinies are intertwined.
UTV Motion Pictures CEO Siddharth Roy Kapur said, “We have been in discussions with Chetan for a while to do something together. When he shared his latest book with us even before it was published, we read it cover to cover in a single sitting.
“It‘s simply un-putdownable. He has crafted such a dramatic plot with such sharply defined characters, that you‘re constantly wondering how things will play out. The issues he deals with in the book are those today‘s youth will instantly relate to and identify with. We‘re very excited to work with him on making a great film from what we all believe is a great book.”
Chetan Bhagat added, “Yes, UTV finally managed to seduce me. A great offer, immense excitement about the story and a wonderful team with a track record makes me feel they can do justice to Revolution 2020, a story very close to me and the readers‘ hearts.”
Every book authored by Bhagat so far has been optioned for movie rights. Rajkumar Hirani‘s 3 Idiots was based on Bhagat‘s first novel, Five Point Someone; while Hallo was made on One Night @ Call Centre.
His later works like 2 States and 3 Mistakes of my Life are also slated to be made into movies by other production houses.
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.
