Born Born to the Late Bhagwandas Kochhar and Lilawati Kochhar, Purshottamdas had his education from Ramjas No.2, Anand Parbat, Delhi. Students from this school have been placed at the highest levels not only in India but also internationally. “I know about one Dr Mahendra Pratap, noted scientist based in the USA and many more, the names of whom I forget, “avers Kumar.
Purshottamdas always had a burning desire to take to acting and once out of school, he applied at the Film Institute, Pune in 1966. At the same time, young Purshottam, took part in the United Producers contest in which he along with Jatin Khanna (Rajesh Khanna), Subhash Ghai and Master Suraj now Sarika emerged top four finalists. Rajesh Khanna got a break with Chetan Anand’s Aakhri Khat and G.P. Sippy’s Raaz while Subhash Ghai got his opening into films with Guru Dutt Films’ Umang. But Purshottamdas had to struggle a bit when he was signed by Ramraj Nahata and Amrit Nahata for their secret agent film Raaton Ka Raja, based on the famous How to Steal a Million that had Vaishali, younger sister of danseuse Madhumati. After the film, Purshottamdas started being related to as ‘Apollo Star’. “It so happened that it was the time when the Apollo spacecraft was launched into space and hence this name,” recounts Kumar adding,” though Raaton Ka Raja didn’t do well, I was appreciated as a handsome dynamic hero and a good dancer.”
Going by the growing popularity, a journalist-friend Late Taraknath Gandhi who used to write for Gujarati magazines like ‘Chitralekha’ and others then suggested that Purshottamdas change his name asking, “How will it sound if a film’s add shows a film featuring Saira Banu and Purshottamdas Kochhar, when heroes sport short names like Dilip Kumar, Ashok Kumar, Kishore Kumar....” I had no clue to his query. Gandhi then announced a contest in ‘Chitralekha’ that read ‘ Suggest a name to a new hero and win an award of Rs. 5000. “Several readers responded to the contest and most of them had opted for the name Dheeraj but it was one Laxmikant who got the award, he being the first person to suggest the name,” beams Kumar. Later going by names like Dilip Kumar, I added ‘Kumar’ to my name and from then started being known as Dheeraj Kumar.
“My producers like Bohra Brothers and others took my career forward and during the period 1970 to 1986, I did 43 films in Hindi, as a hero, 19 films in Punjabi and one film in Bhojpuri as a hero, it was a journey in which I was working and making money but to an extent the satisfaction and fulfillment was not anywhere around. It was a kind of vacuum which led me to do something better. I then started choosing films and did films like Roti Kapda Aur Makaan, Kranti and Shirdi Ke Saibaba with Manoj Kumar, Aaatish with Mohan Kumar, Heera Panna and Darling Darling with Dev Anand, Jaya Chakrawarthi’s Swami and Ratnadeep directed by Basu Chatterjee and many Punjabi films.
In the ensuing period, Kumar met Zuby Godrej who was flying with Air India then. “Our courtship lasted almost for 6 years and on May 26, 1979 we got married. After some time, Zuby left Air India and joined me to shape up my career. Hence Creative Eye was born in 1984.
In 1985-86, when Doordarshan (DD) went commercial, Dheeraj Kumar treaded on a new path combining three facets in himself-acting-producing-directing. “ I put in whatever I had learnt in life and put everything into the new avatar of Dhheraj Kumar,” recounts Kumar. “It was entirely a different experience, he adds. From 1986 till date, Creative Eye has produced 7000 hours of programmes and 700 hours of pure mythological serials that started with Kahan Gaye Woh Log in ‘86, Adalat in ‘86-’87.
The year 1996 saw telecasting of Ramanand Sagar’s Ramayan on DD while B.R. Chopra’s Mahabharat was already given the go ahead. “While discussing one day on the mythological topic, we decided to move forward and create new horizons in creativity by venturing into making mythological serials. Thus by the blessings of Lord Shiva Om Namah Shivay was made in 1997 in association with my wife’s banner Namah Shivay Enterprises. From then there was no looking back. “We created many meaningful mythologicals namely Shri Ganesh, Jap Tap Vratt, Om Namo Narayan, Jai Santoshi Ma so on and so forth. We made these programmes till 2001 and by than satellite channels firmly in place; we started creating programmes for satellite channels also in a big way.
Creative Eye always has been taking upon the challenge and moved into untrodden path where no one has dared to tread. It is the only content provider which ventured into making two serials in Sanskrit namely Hitopadesh and Sushma Valari in 1991 and ‘95 respectively. “Initially, I started Hitopadesh with regular artistes but very soon came to know that neither they were perfect in their diction nor in their emotion, I was told by a good friend of mine to go to a school, situated on the outskirts of Borivili, and approach the people there. They were unknown faces, neither actors but were masters of the language. They used to survive on fruits and were strict disciplinarians. To my surprise, I finished 13 episodes of half hour duration in 13 days.
In March 1996 Creative Eye Pvt. Ltd became a Limited Company and in January, 2000 it got listed on the Bombay Stock Exchange and National Stock Exchange.
Besides Mr. Dheeraj Kumar (Chairman and Managing Director) and Mrs. Zuby Kochhar, (Executive Director), the Board of Directors of the Company comprises of Wg.cdr. Mr. Devendra Dass Kochar, Retd. (Executive Director), Mr M. R. Sivaraman (Non Executive Director), a retired IAS officer who was the Union Revenue Secretary and Executive Director of International Monetary Fund, Mr. Shiv S. Sharma (Non Executive Director), Ex director general, Doordarshan, Mr. T. K Choudhary (Non Executive Director), an ex-IPS officer, retired as DGP (Maharashtra).
The Company has many highly skilled professionals - CFO and COO Mr. Sunil Gupta and in-house chief creative Director and writer Mr. Vikas Kapoor and many other professionals.

Film Production
On the film front, we again dared to venture into filmmaking. We did Aabra Ka Daabra,India’s first 3D plus film. 3D is a technology using which a viewer could watch the film in a regular cinema hall on a normal screen with 3D glasses, including the touring talkies. Normally, with a 3D technology, viewers could see films like Chota Chetan and Chota Jadugar only after the installation of Polaroid lenses in front of the projector and convert a normal screen to a digital screen to get the 3 dimension effect. “In this technology, JVC helped us a lot in terms of hardware that converts JVC cameras into that of 3D plus for the purpose of shooting. Let me tell you that we hold the patent rights of 3D plus,” says a beaming Kumar. Creative Eye has also finalised plans to bring 3D plus programmes on TV, but catering to lakhs of 3D glasses without being able to recover the costs is keeping it away from introducing such programmes on TV. “Who knew IPL would be such a smashing success and God willing , our desire will also be fulfilled one day, “ hopes Kumar adding,” one must have the courage and conviction looking forward for an association from advertisers and agencies to move forward in this segment.”

Media House
Creative Eye also acts as a Marketing company. It sources feature films for broadcasting on satellite as well as terrestrial network. “We have exploited the rights of more than 150 films like Dil, Beta, Raja, Tezab etc and have been new films from time to time, “ says Kumar.

Animation Films
Creative Eye has also ventured into making animation films for theatrical release based on mythological characters, the first one being Nav Durga that shows the nine incarnations of Goddess Durga. On animation films, Kumar says, “for us here in India, it is very difficult to get out of the mythological syndrome because branding the film is very important for an animation film for it to do good business. If we do not take characters from our mythology (most of the characters with whom all of us are attached with) we will not be able to sell our films in the market. People with good marketing background can move out of the mythological shell and make an animated film. Or we have to rely on the characters that we have been relying on or have to tap the innumerable stories of internationally-known characters like Aladdin, Sinbad etc. After all in terms of budget, we have to move on a shoestring budget and our market cannot absorb the cost. It is not easy to make animation films on one’s own. Like a tie up between Yash Raj Films and Walt Disney Films, Creative Eye is open for tie ups with production houses like Disney, Columbia Tristar etc. We have the know-how in storytelling, selection of characters while they have the technical know-how and have huge funds at their command.”

Studios
As Creative Eye is into content creation for TV, which accounts to the companies 70 per cent of mainline business and presently 116 channels beaming into India and 17 GECs requiring 1500 hours of programming per week, the big question arises of space/ studios for shooting and execution of content. Presently, Creative Eye has five studios on lease in the city and one large shooting studio at Umargaon. “ With 12 hours of TV programmes per week currently to be increased to 18 hours in the next six months, it is important to have our own studio in and around Mumbai or even In Gujarat very soon. Going by the thinking, we have decided to have our own studio on the outskirts of Mumbai catering to our own needs of shooting as well as leasing it out to other production houses,” informs Kumar.