Ammanat director Sanjeev Bhattacharya, 37, dies

on Doordarshan nearly a decade ago. His next serial, Campus

, on Zee TV was also well-received. Currently, two of his serials, Amanat

and Challenge

are on air, on Zee and Sony respectively. Amanat

, which recently completed 50 episodes, is Zee’s most successful show today.

Here’s what noted TV director and a friend of Sanjeev’s, Ravi Rai, has to say about him: My association with Sanjeev goes back three years. Then, Sanjeev, along with Raman Kumar, Manish Goswami, Toni and Dia Singh and Karuna Samtani used to have roaring sessions in the evenings. One evening he called me up and told me it was his birthday, and that the gang was having a get-together. He invited me over, and that’s how we first met. He was the quietest of the lot. He’d never get edgy about any jokes — a man who was often at thereceiving end, and yet laughing all the time.

Later, when Campus

was being taken off air, he was upset, but he never sulked. And he had a perpetually smiling face — whether he was happy or not. He never gossiped or commented on anyone else’s work.

The last time I met him was at the Amanat

bash two weeks ago. I congratulated him and told him his serial was doing so well, he was hogging all TRPs. He was glowing that day and had let his hair down to enjoy his success.

His last wish was that we should have one of our sessions soon, because our group hadn’t met for a long time. We were planning to meet on the 18th. Knowing my habit of not turning up, he’d asked me not to back out at the last minute. But then, as John Lennon said in one of his songs: “Life is what happens to you while you’re busy making other plans.”

As a director, he was focussed and totally involved in his work.

This morning I heard Sanjeev was no more. I went to his house and saw him lying there — I’ve never seenanyone look so peaceful. He still had a smile on his face. I looked at him and said, “Sanjeev, what do we do about the 18th now? This time it is you who has backed out.” And he continued to smile on…