Director of Bihar's first Hindi film dead; tribute today

Filmmaker Girish Ranjan, known for making Bihar's first Hindi film 'Kal Hamara Hai', has died of heart ailment. He was 80.
Born in 1934 in Sheikhpura district of Bihar, Ranjan died on November 9 in a hospital here.
The filmmaker started his career as an assistant director to cinema stalwarts like Satyajit Ray, Mrinal Sen and Tapan Sinha, his friend and film critic Vinod Anupam said.
Ranjan came back to Bihar and worked on putting up a team of actors, artistes and technicians from Bihar for 'Kal Hamara Hai' in 1978, which starred Kunal Singh in the lead role.
"Girish Da's, death is a loss to the coming generations of cinema students as he was always there to train and assist them," Mumbai-based director Nitin Chandra said.

The Patna Book Fair, currently underway in the state capital, will screen 'Kal Hamara Hai' today in their 'Bioscope' section to pay tribute to the filmmaker.
Ranjan started his career in production and direction with the 1975 film 'Dak Bangla' which was screened at the 'Belgrade Film Festival', Anupam said.
In the later part of his career, he took to documentary making and directed memorable films like 'Pataliputra Se Patna Tak', 'Virasat', 'Bihar Itihas ke Panno Mein' among others.