Unlike a lot of others in the television industry, Ajay Shrivastav, Creative Head (CH) of Ramayan, hasn’t spent many years in the industry, but is an eager learner. Probably it was this eagerness that made him the CH of Sagar Pictures from being an assistant creative head (ACH) for a very short period at Balaji Telefilms. We at Tellychakkar.com got in touch with Ajay, in time before he was about to discuss creative matters of the show with his subordinates, for our ‘Behind the Lens’ segment. Excerpts: Tell us something about your journey? I completed my BJMC (Bachelor of Journalism and Mass Communication) from Amity University, Noida. The course had various options of which TV was one option. Since I had inclination towards television, I completed my course in TV. In the second year of my course, people from Balaji Telefilms had come down to select students as part of our campus recruitment programme. Out of 200 students, only 20 were selected to come down to Mumbai. I was one of them. Later, among the six who were finally selected, I also found a place. I vividly remember when I was at the Balaji office, the HR there asked me if I would like to do production work or be in the creative team. Then, I did not know the difference between the two trades and hence I asked the HR to explain. And after she did so, she also suggested me that I must be in production team. But, since I liked the profile of a creative, I opted for it. So which was your first show? Well, I joined Tere Liye as an associate creative head (ACH) and I was told that if I work well for a year I would get a better position. But unluckily for me, the show went off-air in 10 months. Apart from that, my final year exams were also nearing. So, I returned to Noida. Later, when I got back, did a few short films. My next show was Dwarkadheesh with Sagar Pictures. Funnily, after joining as an ACH for a very short period when I joined Sagars, I was made the Creative Head (CH) soon. After Dwarkadheesh, I joined Rashmi Sharma’s (Sunrise Productions) Mrs. Kaushik Ki Paanch Bahuein. I must have done the show for a week when I suffered a knee injury and was on complete bed rest for a couple of months thereafter. In the same time, I was offered Ramayan but couldn’t take it because of health reasons. But, when I got better, they offered me the show again and today here I am working as a CH for Ramayan. You have been very lucky to get one show after the other in such a short period of time? Yes, I do consider myself lucky but the entire credit goes to Sagar Pictures for believing in me a lot. Working in a mythological or a historical show is not easy. There is so much to do but they felt I could do it and made me the CH. Now that you’ve done both, tell us how different is it working in a mythological show compared to a daily soap? In a daily soap, you can shoot with natural make-up that takes between 30 to 40 minutes, but in a mythological show it takes no less than 2 to 3 hours for an actor to dress up. Importantly, you just cannot shoot wherever you feel like, as you have Kings and Queens. Hence, you have to find a proper location and then work on it accordingly. Currently, though Ramayan comes just once a week, we have been shooting for it almost for five days. Now, can you understand the amount of hard work that goes into making mythological? What are the drawbacks of doing a mythological show? Drawbacks! No no, there is nothing of that kind. In fact, you just get better as you are handling things on a larger scale than you’d handle a daily soap. But then, people make it look small. While I was joining Dwarkadheesh, a lot of people had told me that I would be tagged as a mytho creative and that I wouldn’t get dailies. In fact, I did feel it was probably true when Dwarkadheesh went off-air and I had to search for another show. But then I did get Mrs. Kaushik Ki Paanch Bahuein. A lot of directors do not like a creative’s interference. Have you come across something like this? I have faced such situations, but completely understand it. The post of a creative is completely new to the industry; it did not even exist a few years ago. Earlier, a director used to be a one man army. But, I think it’s good that the job has been assigned to different people as maintaining certain things get easy that way. You cannot expect a director to shoot as well as handle everything that’s happening on the sets, sit on the edit and also send the telecast to the channel. They won’t even be able to answer calls from the channel every now and then. At the end of the day, the quality of work will suffer. What do you have to say about complains of creatives not doing much on the sets? They are true to an extent. There are a lot of creatives who do not do much. But, this usually happens on the sets where there are 3 to 4 ACHs. But for somebody like me, who is the only CH on sets, there is no time to sit. I think whoever is given the post, he or she must work towards making the best of it and not misuse it. How is it shooting in Baroda? There are two kinds of people; one who work, go home and sleep. There are others who work and have a social life. The ones who have a social life, find it very difficult to stay in a place like this as there is no social life after nine o’clock. Plus, the only people you meet are your cast and crew. In fact, one cannot even expect a cup of coffee anytime in the day, for if you want to have coffee you’d have to travel 4 to 5 kms. This is one reason why Vishal Karwal, lead actor of Dwarkadheesh used to go to Mumbai every Friday and get back to Baroda on a Monday. What’s next on the chart? As of now, I am focusing on learning as much as I can, for a creative must know everything that’s happening on the sets. If he does not know certain things, he has no right to point that out to other people. I learnt make-up from the make-up dada on the sets. I’ve also learnt about the dress material and the jewellery. I am currently learning the set set-up and about the materials that do not catch fire and various other things. So, once I am well worst with all of this I will make the next move.