Channels look at the marketing of a show first, that's why a lot of shows are lost these days : Prashant Bhargava

We have done somewhere around 150 wild life and tribal documentaries! Prashant Bhargava likes being in the industry and making his kind of things, so he prefers being a producer. His current show Adhura Bandhan runs on DD and has completed 100 episodes. He plans to come up with a new show on Me Home titled Main Tumhari Ladli Naina and this would be his first step to mark on the satellite channels. He is well known for his tribal documentaries that have won Best Film Awards on the international circuit. When and how did you enter the industry? I have been in the industry for 12 years. Television just happened to me. It wasn't something I had planned for. As for how I got into the industry, I used to play university level cricket then and during rains as I had nothing much to do I would act in plays at that time. Later I got this small role in a show Mujhe Chand Chahiye on Zee. So, that was my first step in the industry later I directed a few shows including Naaginn on Zee. I also made an English movie The Unforgettable with Kay Kay Menon and Perizaad Zorabian. When and how did you get into production? I was working as a director when I came across a tribe which I felt should be shown to the world and that is how I first produced a documentary. Even while I was directing I always felt I missed the creative satisfaction and once I got a chance to do something on my own I grabbed it. I have been making tribal films since a long time now and my movies won the Best Film Award at the International Tribal Film Festival in both 2008 and 2009. 52 countries had participated in the festival but both the times my films Lamsena (2009) and Oh Loha Gundi Raja (2008) won the best Film Awards. You are a co-producer for a show on DD but do you also plan to make shows for satellite channels? Yes, I do plan to do some work with the current satellite channels and I am talking to them about some shows. But the only issue is the channels think from a marketing perspective. So, when we go to them with a story they look at its selling value first and then the entertainment value. I think this is one reason why good subjects are lost these days. The marketing wing of a channel looks at its value completely but the creative one looks at the content. So, once the first level is done with only then it goes to the second level. What all are you working on at present? I have a show on Me Home titled Main Tumhari Ladli Naina. Apart from this I am working on a movie, a suspense thriller but the thing that works in the industry is if your proposal is good you will get a lot of good scripts. By proposal I mean the star cast. If you have people like Salman (Khan) and Priyanka (Chopra) in the lead your work is done. I will then have 50 writers in front of my office. So, this one is still on its way. But, isn't the script still a lot more important than the star cast? Yes, it is and Indian market does not even help you recover the amount that one pays to these big names. The ones who take big names in their films have to somewhere compromise with the making of the film. But, even today's films with good scripts sell and the best examples are Khosla Ka Ghosla, Tere Bin Laden and A Wednesday. None of them had a big star cast but they worked. A corporate can handle the big star budgets but not independent/private producers. But, things are changing now and there are going to more of the private players. You have done a lot of documentaries? Yes, I have done most of it for DD; we had done around 13 episodes of Sufivad documentaries. We also did a documentary called Sarfaroshane Vatan, it was all about freedom fighters that India and world does not recognize. In this series we even interviewed the freedom fighters who are still alive. Then we did Naya Dwar which was more of an informative program. We informed people about the government plans through it. We have done somewhere around 150 wild life and tribal documentaries. Documentaries allow you to explore a lot so much that is still unknown to the people of our own country.