Hindi
YRF uses Howrah Bridge for ‘Detective Byomkesh Bakshi’ publicity
KOLKATA: A group of 50 dancers brought out a flash mob on the iconic Howrah Bridge in Kolkata to mark its 72nd birthday today. Wearing the typical Bengali white dhoti, the group of dancers started dancing on the bridge early in the morning against the sound track ‘Calcutta Kiss’ from Dibakar Banerjee’s upcoming Hindi movie Detective Byomkesh Bakshi, which has been produced by Yash Raj Films.
Flash mobs are a common film promotional strategy in Bollywood or even Hollywood. This innovative campaign was praised by the city people and brand experts feel that YRF is leaving no stone unturned to publicize Detective Byomkesh Bakshi, which stars Sushant Singh Rajput in the lead role.
Carrying posters, which read ‘Happy Birthday Howrah Bridge’, the flash mob cheered for the iconic structure used by more than 1,20,000 vehicles and around 5,00,000 pedestrians to cross the Hooghly river flowing between the twin cities of Howrah and Kolkata. Howrah Bridge is a cantilever bridge with a suspended span over the Hooghly River in West Bengal.
The bridge is one of two on the Hooghly River and is a famous symbol of Kolkata. The third-longest cantilever bridge at the time of its construction, the Howrah Bridge is the sixth-longest bridge of its type in the world.
The flash mob was a promotional activity for the film, which is scheduled to be released on 3 April. Howrah Bridge, a British engineering marvel, was thrown open to commuters on 3 February, 1943 but never had a formal inauguration due to security issues during World War II.
“Detective Byomkesh Bakshi is set in the same time zone as the birth of Howrah Bridge and the team was keen to honour the bridge in their way. The bridge is a very important element in the film which was also seen in the poster image,” said a statement from YRF.
Renamed as Rabindra Setu, the 705-metre-long cantilever bridge is among the busiest in the world.
Hindi
Jio Studios unveils AI-powered Krishna teaser at NAB Show 2026
Global first look of Krishna uses Galleri5 AI pipeline on Azure, Historyverse slate as Jio’s Dhurandhar crosses Rs 3,000cr worldwide.
MUMBAI: Krishna has just dropped a divine teaser and this time the gods are powered by silicon, not just scripture. Jio Studios and Collective Studios’ Historyverse stole the spotlight at the NAB Show 2026 in Las Vegas with the world’s first teaser for their upcoming theatrical feature Krishna, directed by Manu Anand. The big reveal happened during Microsoft’s keynote “Powering Intelligent Media, From AI Experimentation to Real-World Impact,” where the film’s AI-native production pipeline took centre stage alongside Collective Artists Network’s in-house platform, Galleri5.
At the heart of this mythological spectacle lies a fresh cinematic workflow built by Galleri5 on Microsoft Azure’s advanced AI and cloud infrastructure. Forget bolting AI onto traditional VFX or animation, this is an end-to-end, production-grade system woven into every layer: world-building, character creation, shot design and final output. Yet the storytelling remains firmly director-led, emphasising emotional depth, stillness, music and performance rather than pure spectacle. The result? Large-format theatrical cinema rooted in Indian history and culture, but conceived in ways that were simply not possible before.
Collective Artists Network runs Galleri5 natively on Azure, leveraging Microsoft Foundry and cutting-edge AI tools to handle film, episodic and advertising workflows in a secure enterprise environment. Microsoft highlighted Collective as a “Frontier” organisation successfully moving AI from pilot projects to real production-scale deployment in cinema. The technology is also on display at Microsoft’s NAB booth in the West Hall (Booth W1731).
Jio Studios (Media & Content Business, Reliance Industries), president Jyoti Deshpande said the project advances the studio’s mission to take Indian stories global with scale, ambition and authenticity, “With Krishna, we are embracing cutting-edge AI-led filmmaking while democratising these tools to make them more accessible, intuitive and cost-effective for storytellers everywhere.”
Collective Artists Network founder & group CEO Vijay Subramaniam added, “We’re using technology developed in India to carry our culture and history to audiences worldwide at a scale never seen before.”
Microsoft, vice president for telco media & entertainment, gaming Silvia Candiani noted that the media industry has reached an inflection point, “AI is no longer about experimentation but delivering real impact at production scale… By building AI-native creative systems on Microsoft Azure, Collective exemplifies how storytellers can unlock new formats, move faster and realise a true return on intelligence while keeping human creativity at the centre.”
Krishna forms part of Historyverse, Collective Studios’ ambitious slate of history and culture-driven IPs. The slate draws from iconic figures and traditions that shaped the Indian subcontinent, including stories inspired by Kali, Karna and Durga. It builds on the already-released Mahabharat: Ek Dharmayudh series, showing how ancient narratives can be reimagined for modern screens.
Jio Studios, India’s leading content studio and the media and content arm of Reliance Industries, continues its blockbuster run. The studio’s Dhurandhar franchise led by Dhurandhar and Dhurandhar: The Revenge has become the first Indian film series to cross Rs 3,000 crore worldwide. It also delivered three consecutive years of India’s highest-grossing Hindi films: Stree 2 (2024), Dhurandhar (2025) and Dhurandhar: The Revenge (2026). In just eight years, Jio Studios has assembled a library of over 160 films and series, with more than 60 titles winning over 500 awards. Other notable successes include Laapataa Ladies (India’s official Oscar entry 2025), Stree, Article 370, Shaitaan and Mrs.
The NAB unveiling marks another step in Jio Studios and Collective’s push to blend Indian storytelling talent with frontier technology proving that the future of cinema may well be both ancient in spirit and thoroughly modern in execution. For audiences who love epic tales with a fresh twist, Krishna promises to deliver divine drama, this time with a little help from the cloud.
