On Monday, the shy student created history by becoming the first film technician of India to win an Oscar. "This recognition is important for all the technicians of India. They are often neglected as foreign technicians are preferred over them," says Feroz Abbas Khan, director of ‘Gandhi My Father’. Music maestro A R Rahman too made a similar point while expressing his delight over Pookutty's Oscar nominations.

"There is a huge talent pool in India that needs international recognition. Pookutty's success will open opportunities for other film technicians in every department. In the time of recession, it may bring in more international funds to the market," says Dilip Ghosh, president of FTII, the alumnus association of FTII.

Pookutty calls the 2007-film one of the landmark projects of his career as it gave him a wide canvas to work on. "It was a matter of life and death for Resul to get the right sound. He would often fight to get what he wanted. This is something which infuriated me, but also made me respect him. This passion has brought him this success." says Khan.

Though Kumar is yet to see ‘Slumdog Millionaire’, amongst all of Pookutty's works Black remains his favourite. "The way he played with silence and sound in Black as well as created ambience sound are superb," he says. Inspired by Pookutty's success, Kumar expects more applications for the sound engineering course at FTII this year.

At Pookutty's send off party earlier this month, director-actor Rajat Kapoor with whom he has done a number of films including his first, revealed how the sound designer built his savings, invested in equipment and eventually set up a sound studio "Canaries".