Sandeep Chattopadhyay

The national award winning director of Sundar Jeebon, Sandeep Chatterjee is a filmmaker and teacher of cinema, whose work spans around 25 years. If you ask him, however, he is likely to tell you that he is still a student. In the late eighties, Sandeep quit studying science because he loved images. He traveled to the fabled Film and Television Institute of India (FTII), Pune, of which he is a distinguished alumnus, and now head of the department of Direction & Screenwriting. His current assignment came on the back of decades of work, impressive for both breadth and depth. Apart from Sundar Jeebon, a film based on fiction writing of the iconic Bengali poet Jibananda Das, that won the President's medal, Sandeep has made influential films like Raat koto holo, which have been screened at different festivals and film schools. Sandeep's teaching career began at the Satyajit Ray Film and Television Institute of India in Kolkata, an institution he helped from its early days, to make one of the country's premier film schools. He has taught film and lectured in film schools across continents: from Taipei to Tolouse, and closer home, at Subhash Ghai's Whistling Woods and Mindscreen Film Institute in Chennai. Sandeep has been on the jury of various film awards and travels the globe for workshops and symposiums. His focus, wherever he goes, is on making the art of cinema more accessible and inclusive. He is also a firm believer in creating art by 'working with what you have'; just one of the reasons why his legion of students respect and love him.