In our third segment Mr. Shyam Benegal talks about his career in advertising, and how he got into feature films. He took a circuitous route before he started making feature films. He spent 14 years in the advertising world, and produced about 150 films per year. He made ad films for Gold Spot, Thums Up, Rexona, Surf and Amul. He was part of the creative team that came up with the Amul butter baby mascot.

After spending 14 years in the advertising industry, he took a sabbatical and traveled to the US on a Homi Bhabha fellowship. In the US he attended a children's TV workshop, and worked briefly at Boston's WGBH and NY WNET. When he returned to India, he got busy with the production of his first feature film.

Mr. Benegal made his first feature film Ankur in 1973. Everybody in the film was a newcomer, except for the camera person Govind Nihalani.

After the success of Ankur, Mr. Benegal went on to make films like Mandi, Nishant, Bhumika, Junoon, Manthan, Kalyug, Zubeida and Netaji Subhas Chandra Bose: The Forgotten Hero .

Mr. Benegal introduced many talented actors like Shabana Azmi, Anant Nag, Smita Patil, and Naseerudin Shah among others to the Indian film industry.

Besides feature films, Mr. Benegal has made TV documentaries and one of his best-known series is Bharat:Ek Khoj, based on Jawaharlal Nehru's Discovery of India.

A prolific film-maker, Mr. Benegal has no plans to retire and is busy with his next project called Chamki.

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