Actor Soumitra Chatterjee, winner of this year’s Dadasaheb Phalke Award, is a man upon whom greatness was thrust, and yet greatness has passed him by, says fellow actor Victor Banerjee
Let me preface everything by saying what a proud moment it is for all of us citizens of Bengal, and actors and technicians in Tollygunge, that our homegrown and Banga-nurtured Soumitro has been honoured with the Dadasaheb Phalke Award.
In the late fifties of the last century, my parents and I were vacationing in Madras. It happened to be Saraswati Puja and my father insisted we visit the home of a family friend to give Pushpanjali. My memories of the day are very vague, but I do remember my mother being very impressed by the fact that our host’s son had just starred in a film called Apur Sansar. We were shown black-and-white pictures and I peered over my mother’s shoulder to stare at the young, fresh and handsome countenance of Soumitro Chatterjee.
The years have gone by and that same face today is lined with the experience of years of happiness and some pain; when I look deep into Soumitro’s beautiful eyes and beyond the fascinating crease of his disarming smile, it gives me pause. Here was a man upon whom greatness had been thrust, and yet, greatness seemed to have passed him by. At his peak in commercial Tollygunge, he was overshadowed by the mesmeric presence of our greatest matinee idol, Uttam Kumar, and there are many who would argue that their rivalry bordered on the unfriendly.
My first Bengali film, Dui Prithibhi, was sponsored by the Silpi Sangsad, an artistes’ organisation headed by Uttam Kumar, while a rival faction had already emerged under the stewardship of Soumitro called the Abhinetri Sangha. Being a peripheral observer who never really bothered about the politics of Tollywood and its factions, I could plainly see egos being fanned by sycophants and petty bickering giving way to meanness and petty-mindedness. I am not going to start pointing fingers at anyone, and my being awkwardly judgmental after all these years is only because I saw it all as a senseless waste of time in both camps by two great personalities who both had so much to be proud of and grateful for, and yet… hubris can make ambition a futile chase through nebulous webs of jealousy and intrigue that ensnare intellects whose focus seldom goes beyond the looking-glass they stare into every working day. “Striving to better, oft we mar what’s well” — King Lear, as Soumitro must know.
Putting it plainly, competing with Uttam Kumar was a complete waste of time. And Soumitro had a fan following, all his own, that would die for him. Two amusing comparisons are Amitabh Bachchan who went to Bombay to be recognised as an actor and went on to become the mega-star of all time and Naseer(uddin Shah) who went to Bombay to become a star only to end up becoming its most talked-about and respected actor.
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There can be no doubt whatsoever, of course, that if Manikda (Satyajit Ray) hadn’t launched Soumitro as his favourite actor, Soumitro’s climb to great heights would have been a lot tougher. But I must be one of his few admirers who always felt that most of Soumitro’s memorable “performances”, as a solid actor, were in non-Ray films — baap-re-baap, don’t jump down my throat; yes, yes, I know there are a few notable exceptions. In my limited world, however, let’s compare Prabhat Roy’s Laathi with Ray’s Ghare Baire. In his brief appearance in Laathi, Soumitro gave the audience moments that they loved, and I stood and watched in silent admiration as he acted the scenes out beside me. I think Soumitro as a young man had the fearlessness to work to impress Ray but, as he grew older, he held the great master in such awe that he listened to and mimicked his director more than he contributed spontaneously to the characters he portrayed.
Now, it would also be remiss of me not to stir up a little thought-provocation. After all, a recipient of the Dadasaheb Phalke Award should have a standing that makes him, or her, a champion of little causes. For a couple of decades, Soumitro has played an influential role and led various Tollygunge guilds. Soumitro, who now portrays Lear regularly on stage, must often ponder on lines such as, “Our basest beggars / Are in the poorest thing superfluous: / Allow not nature more than nature needs, / Man’s life's cheap as beast’s”. For some reason, heads that wear crowns in India never lie uneasy. Our leaders command respect they often haven’t earned and are never held accountable for what goes on under their very noses in their social or political constituencies.
Soumitro, as we all know, was, and I say was, an avowed CPI(M) supporter who bowed and kowtowed to Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee for reasons that must have borne fruit when gaslights on the streets were doused. He was a leader and wielded considerable clout and influence in all the workers’ guilds. And yet, under his tutelage CITU (the Centre for Indian Trade Unions) ran amok and made a mockery of every aspect of the film industry. Cards were issued to drivers who became makeup artists or dressers overnight. Film extras remained an area of disgraceful human neglect and labour exploitation. Wage scales remained utterly disorganised and disgracefully low, with production spotboys earning more than assistant directors. Besides that, stupid union laws continue to foist an unwanted and unnecessary number of assistant directors and cameramen upon a production. Obey or pay the consequences remained the ground rule of Marxist Bengal. Far from these additions contributing to efficiency, all they did, and do, is make matters more chaotic for everybody. The condition of cars that one is compelled by union laws to use are appalling and the allowances given to technicians are all “negotiable” to the point where everyone is stabbing everyone else in the back. CITU and its parents in Writers’ Building drove every nail they could possibly find into our cinema world’s rotten coffin.
“Come not between the dragon and his wrath”, another quote from Lear, is the fear that engulfed everyone who questioned labour policies or ruffled communist feathers. Our lives remained “as cheap as beast's” in a society whose morality was based on the upliftment of the working classes.
But, with the winds of change, some people have judiciously changed track. So all is not lost and one hopes that Soumitro, given the well-deserved social recognition he has just received, feels burdened with social responsibility and, armed with his new-found allies and the friendship of a Didi who seriously thinks about the poorest of the poor, takes up arms against the sea of troubles that plague us.
The shackled people of Bengal and the helpless workers of the film industry have to give up the pretence that the moving shadows on the wall, cast by a sputtering lamp of sarisa tel, are of an existence that is unreal, unattainable and so should be shunned for all its deceptive glamour and success. Mamata (Banerjee) is full of good intention. I would like to see Soumitro take advantage of it and in the twilight of his life make an indelible contribution towards the upliftment of an Industry that has now given him its highest award and accolade. We need our self-respect restored; we must believe that nothing can ever “smite flat the thick rotundity” of our janmobhoomi.
