The Complete Magazine

  From Rejections to Reinvention: How Grit, Comics & Courage Shaped My Creative Madness Back in the late 80s and well into the 90s, I was fighting hard for my place in the unforgiving world of advertising and industrial photography. It wasn’t glamorous. It wasn’t easy. And it definitely wasn’t kind. I faced rejections, disappointments, rebukes, and days where failure stared me straight in the eye. Yet somehow, I never let my innocence go. I became street-smart, but I never became bitter. What kept me going was my stubborn “never give up” spirit… and books! Yes, books. Not the philosophical, heavy, intellectual ones—but the *real* lifesavers. Comics. Cosmopolitan. Vogue. Women’s magazines that taught me how to survive office politics, stay sane, navigate egos, ignore unnecessary drama, and rise above noise. I would rent them from my local circulation library and devour every page like oxygen. Alongside those, I’d splurge on photography magazines—especially American giants like...

**— Life at a Photo Studio Where Drama, Laughter & Madness Never Needed a Script** Working in a photography studio can give you many things in life — • **experience** • **lifelong friendships** • **plenty of grey hair** • and more importantly… a never-ending library of comedy scenes that no Bollywood writer could ever imagine 🤣 Some moments refuse to fade — even after decades. They live inside our hearts, and every time we narrate them, the laughter rolls out fresh, warm, and crispy… just like a good Hyderabad jalebi. Here are two of my absolute favourites. --- ## 🍯 1️⃣ The Great Jalebi Avalanche It was one of those classic late-night shoots — Tripods standing like soldiers, wires crawling like snakes on the floor, lights blazing like interrogation lamps, and six of us attacking biryani like hungry wolves discovering an extinct animal. Someone wiped sweat from his forehead and declared: **“Boss… biryani ke baad kuch meetha hona!”** And like every sensible Hyderabadi at 1:00 AM, I...

  A Framed Beginning. A Fateful Friendship. A Destiny Developed in the Darkroom. (The real history behind Poona’s iconic Art Gallery Photo Studio begins with one man’s courage and one friend’s belief.) After the Partition, when trains carried more loss than luggage, my grandfather ** Hemandas Fathumal Ramchandani ** stepped into Devlali with little more than his stubborn courage and a pair of skilled hands. Like countless Sindhis who had been scattered overnight, he carried no wealth — just the quiet determination to rebuild. In Devlali, he returned to what he did best: framing memories for others while carrying his own unframed heartbreak within. (Early years of our family’s photography journey started with simple framing work in Devlali and Poona.) Life moved slowly but steadily. A few years later, with hope leading and necessity pushing, he shifted to Poona. The family squeezed into a small home, and the framing shop became the centre of survival. The two elder sons joined the b...

  *(A true story of cinema, comedy & pure Hyderabad magic)* If you’ve lived in Hyderabad long enough, you already know— **our theatres don’t just *play* movies… they *participate* in them.** And that day, at a packed evening show of * Don’t Breathe *, I learned this lesson all over again. The film itself is a masterclass in tension. A blind ex-military man , a dark house, three young robbers, and silence so tight you could hear your own pulse. My kids and I were glued to our seats, clutching the armrests like they were lifejackets. **This wasn’t just a movie. This was therapy for blood pressure patients—if they survived it, they were cured.** The hall was pitch dark. A creaky wooden floor. One robber already dead. The other two trembling like goats on Bakrid morning. And then… The blind man slowly enters the room, gun in hand, breathing like a dragon who lost his spectacles. The audience? Frozen. Nobody moved. Even the popcorn boy was standing like a statue at the door, mid-s...

  Industrial photography can take you to factories, furnaces, forests, and sometimes… straight into the jaws of madness. And this story? This one is served piping hot with fear, fun, and full Hyderabadi attitude. It began like any other assignment—me and my assistant sitting in the rear seat of a faithful old **Ambassador**, a car so legendary it should’ve had its own Aadhaar card. The roads were silent, the breeze was cool, and we were busy discussing important things in life: • Whether the chai at the next dhaba will have proper “adhrak ka kick.” • Why wide-angle lenses behave like moody girlfriends. • And whether advertising agencies secretly enjoy torturing photographers. All was well… until the trees began to thicken like the plot of a thriller movie. Welcome to the ** Midnight Jungle Route **—no streetlights, no humans, no hope. Only darkness, crickets, mysterious howls, and us. And then the heavens opened. Not a drizzle. Not rain. No. This was ** Baarish: The Revenge **. She...

*How a Rookie Photographer Learned That “Travel Arranged by Client” Can Mean Anything* Industrial photography is a field where surprises lurk around every corner. You sign up for a shoot but end up collecting stories—free of cost, non-returnable, lifetime warranty. Yet nothing, absolutely nothing, prepared me for what happened in the summer of 1984. Industrial photography stories India Back then, I was a rookie industrial and advertising photographer, fresh in the game, driven by ambition, caffeine, and the foolish optimism that I could handle anything. Every assignment felt like a ticket to fame, fortune, and maybe even a magazine cover someday. So when a reputed cement plant owner called—complete with a baritone voice that could shake a Dictaphone—I stood straighter. Behind the scenes photography “Confirmed,” he said. “Travel arranged. We’ll take you 250 kilometers to the plant and drop you back. Don’t worry.” And in my head? Oh, I worried… in a good way. I had already imagined a shi...

  There’s a special kind of joy in taking a gang of hardcore masala-movie fans to a film they know *nothing* about. My friends walked into the theatre expecting the usual Hyderabadi wishlist: item numbers , dhinchak dialogues , hero entry in slow motion … the full * tadka * package. Instead? They were greeted by a slow-burn African comedy with barely any dialogues, deep cultural layers, and long scenes where even the trees were acting better than the humans. But did the boys care? **Bilkul nahi.** If the movie didn’t entertain them, they’d entertain *the movie*. Within minutes, they created their own commentary track—running jokes, whispers, wild theories—basically a Hyderabadi director’s cut playing live in row J. Then came *that* iconic scene. Two African tribal hunters walking through the forest, carrying a freshly hunted deer on a bamboo pole. Silence. Stillness. Shadows. Suddenly they freeze—there’s a snake on the path. Both men go statue-mode. Tension so thick you could sl...

  # **The Blind Ride: When Hyderabad Survived My Midnight Madness** *A “The Complete Magazine” Original Tale* Hyderabad of the ’80s had its own charm—quiet nights, buzzing streets, and one absolute menace on two wheels: **me**. Every night, once the studio shutter clanged shut, my faithful beast—the legendary ** Yamaha RX 100 **—would awaken. Smooth, loud, and wickedly fast. But the real twist? I’d slip on a pair of ** pitch-black sunglasses **—the iconic * Karamchand spy shades *—long after sunset. Not for fashion. Not for swag. But to *scare the living daylights* out of the city. Picture it: a lean silhouette tearing through the dim-lit streets, wearing sunglasses at night. Drivers froze. Pedestrians jumped aside. One guy even shouted, **“Arrey baap re! Andha admi bike chala raha!”** (Oh God! A blind man is riding a bike!) Little did they know—my vision was perfect. My intentions? Questionable. ### **The Real Fun Began When Someone Asked for a Lift** I had one rule: If the guy l...

  This nostalgic tale from a vintage Hyderabad photo studio shows how every portrait session was an event… In the bustling lanes of 1960s Hyderabad — a time when the city still smelled of Irani chai , bicycle bells, and slow-moving charm — lived a man who could turn an ordinary studio visit into a life-changing experience. His name was ** Naraindas Ramchandani **. To many, he was a photographer. To those who met him, he was pure magic. Uncle wasn’t just ahead of his time — he was decades ahead. A man who blended the manners of a classic Hyderabadi gentleman with the razor-sharp instincts of a marketing mastermind. When others were busy clicking dull, expressionless passport photos, he was crafting *characters*. Transforming everyday citizens into stars. And yes… laughing his way to the bank. --- ## **The Man With the X-Ray Vision** Uncle had a gift — an eye that could size up a customer’s personality, confidence, and more importantly… ** spending potential ** within seconds. Some...