Speaking to Subhash K Jha, honouring and reminiscing, Milap Jhaveri and Manoj Muntashir speak about the noted filmmaker Sanjay Gupta, who recently passed away.
Milap Zaveri: “I was 21, Sir, when I met him and I still remember he called me to his office which was opposite Chandan cinema. Sujoy Ghosh is the one who had recommended me to him, sent me to him because he needed someone to write the dialogues for Kaante. And he met me, he gave me two scenes and he said, Likh ke aa , on a Saturday evening. And I went on Sunday afternoon with the two scenes. he heard them and he called Hussain Bhai, his production manager and said give Milaap 21,000 rupees, he’s writing Kaante. So at 21,Sir, I wrote dialogues of Kaante. He changed my life. He gave me Musafir, he gave me Plan. When I was at the low ebb of my career, he called me and said, Don’t sit at home, come, Shootout At Wadala likh . He gave me Shootout At Wadala, which is one of the biggest films of my career as a dialogue writer. He gave me Woodstock Villa, Alibaug, so much, so much I worked with him. When my directorial Satyamev Jayate 2 failed, again the first person who called me and said come and start work , was him for Miranda Brothers. He was the first person who approached me to write again. He’s been my guru, he’s been my mentor. Many years back he took me and my wife to Durban for an award function in South Africa. He made sure we were treated like royalty as well as him and Anu, his wife. And in Durban, one day he just came up to me, he knew I was going through some financial stress and he said, yeh leh 1000 dollar jaa, Gauri pe kharch kar, take a shopping. He was a dildar, zinda dil man and he was my life, he was my guru. I met him ten days back at his Mata Ki Chowki and he was so, so, so excited of the next film I was making. Even when my announcement came with Adi and Tara Sutaria, Aditya Roy Kapoor and Tara Sutaria, he called me 5 days back, delighted. But one thing he told me, Milap, I’m in director’s hell since 3-4 years and now I’m going to make Kaante 2, I’m going to make my best film. He was so excited about Kaante 2 and he had started work on the script, the music and he told me, I’ll make you hear it, we’ve got to do it, this that. So he was a zinda dil sher, Sir. And he’ll always be my guru, he’ll always be my Gups and he’ll be the man who resurrected me, my godfather in this industry. He was my father, my friend, my brother. Sir, I still remember when I gave three hits as a writer, back to back, Shootout at Wadala, Grand Masti and Main Tera Hero. He threw a party, sir. He threw a huge party to celebrate me. The whole industry he called and the media.Which director, producer throws a party for his writer? He was just… he just lived life, you know, kingsize, sir. And he was, he was all heart, he was all heart.”
Manoj Muntashir: “Sanjay Gupta’s sudden and untimely passing has left me deeply saddened. I had the pleasure of working with him on a couple of films and will always remember him as a filmmaker with an unmistakable style and a wonderfully unconventional mind. While working with him on Kaabil, I realised that Sanjay was simply incapable of thinking ordinarily. He always had to think out of the box. He was also a wonderful poet with a deep love for poetry, which I believe gave the songs in his films their distinctive soul.Kaante, which was hailed in its time as one of the most stylish films in Indian cinema, was a perfect reflection of his bold aesthetic and unique sensibility. There won’t be another Sanjay Gupta. He was truly one of a kind. Will miss you, Gups.”
