KNT Sastry touched lives with his engaging cinema

K NT Sastry, the much acclaimed award-winning filmmaker, critic, author and publisher, breathed his last at his Trimulgherry residence in the late hours of Thursday. Garnering success and reverence in all the fields that he had ventured into, Sastry, a journalist-turned-director was committed to making socially relevant films and didn’t subscribe to commercial norms. Sastry, in his early years, had the inclination to document the history of

Telugu cinema

in English. He made several efforts on that front by publishing stories, writing monographs on legendary storytellers including Nagaiah, Nagireddy, Bhanumati and Chakrapani.

The film bug bit him when his regular columns on films went onto pique the filmmaker in him. Sastry’s first brush with filmdom came when director B Narsing Rao and team were looking for a promising writer for their film Daasi. He bid goodbye to his flourishing journalism career and took a leap of faith. It paid off. Sastry went on to make films both in Kannada and Telugu. Thilaadanam, Kamli, Sarasammana Samadhi are just a few of his gems. He also joined hands with many social welfare outfits to make poignant documentaries, the most prominent being the one on Surabhi theatre group.Remembering the veteran, dialogue writer-actor
LB Sriram, who worked with Sastry in Kamli alongside Nandita Das, shares, “Though we had very little personal interaction beyond work, he made an impact on me. he was a simple man, who spoke less and was eager to do his bit for society through his films. Kamli was a film that gave me a lot of professional satisfaction and he was instrumental in helping me break out of the commercial cinema mould. Telugu industry needs more people like him.”

Sahitya Akademi

award winner and a good friend of Sastry, Devi Priya admits that he will miss the hearty conversations he had with his pal. “We met as journalists and we moved onto other fields later. He was a multi-faceted personality who only spread warmth to those around him. I had last met him six months before he fell ill. His films were backed by strong literary value, emotional content and frankly, he deserved better recognition.”