Remembering DDK Mumbai on its 41st Birthday.....on 2nd October 2012

The Who's Who of Doordashan ...Back to the roots

On 2nd October 2012 DDK Mumbai celebrates its 41st birthday. The Kendra was set up on 2nd oct 1972. The last major celebrations took place  on Oct.2nd 2006 when I was the director of the Kendra.

We had especially invited all the past Producers, Engineers, Programmers.

The list of the who's who included Gajendra Singh, past video editor of DDK Mumbai who is today a successful creative head and the originator of Antakshari on Zee TV.

The Pub Casters who served  Doordarshan for nation building

Felicitation of Pradeep Bhide the Newscaster of DD Sahyadri

Bijondas Gupta , a successful Art director with Bollywood, once headed the Scenic department of DDK Mumbai.

Satish Bhatia a cameraman, associated with the popular serial Yeh Jo Hai Zindagi.

Madhvi Mutatkar, programme executive of DDK, later resigned and headed the Zee TV as its President.

  

Madhvi Mutatkar

Bijon Das Gupta

Vinay Apte , now a popular Actor and Director in the Marathi Film Industry, worked as the producer at DDK Mumbai.

Who does'nt know about the popular serial Aahat on Sony. But how many of us know that BP Singh the Director and Cameraman was DDK Mumbai's product . He too came for the reunion.

Also present was Nina Raut , the producer of the successful programme Tak Dhina Dhin which ran on DD sahyadri for more then 7 years. (Incidentally her husband Mr Bharat Kumar Raut is the sitting Shiv Sena MP from Rajya sabha).   

Neena Raut

Bharat Kumar Raut

Aadesh Bandekar who fought the recent election on Shiv Sena ticket, was present to grace the occasion.

Manju singh, Pradeep Bhide (the evergreen newscaster of DDK), Yakoob Sayeed, Madhu Shrivastav....the list is end less

Bijon das Gupta, Gajendra Singh and BP Singh

BP Singh of CID fame

Gajendra Singh of Sur Keshtra

After the telecast of the programme, I received numerous letters and phone calls from all parts of Maharashtra. Some thing new, something different was presented to Sahyadri viewers.

The Times of India , 8th Oct 2006 wrote an article entitled THEY KILLED THE RADIO by Bella Jasinghani. I quote the 1st para from it:

"Comparing two dinosaur not always a futile exercise. Last week,Vividh Bharti & Doordarshan (DD) observed their anniversaries one day apart. Sahyadri, which is the name Mumbai DD goes by, hosted a hugely successful live gathering of television stalwarts to celebrate its 35th birthday on Oct 2.However the very next day,Vividh Bharati, the radio station that was once the opium of the masses, stumbled its way into its golden jubilee without any fanfare"......

Hope in its 41st year DDK Mumbai will do something different, something new for its numerous FANS out there..