Ritwik Ghatak centenary | Why filmmakers after him, from FTII and beyond, are drawn to the rebel auteur

For Ritwik Ghatak, the Draupadi-like Neeta (Meghe Dhaka Tara/The Cloud-Capped Star, 1960) was the captious lens to observe the dialectical contradictions of societal conflicts: contented vs modernity, idiosyncratic vs collective, story vs history. For his Film and Television Institute of India (FTII), Pune, protégé John Abraham — no, not the beefed-up Bollywood histrion but the maverick Malayalam manager — a donkey becomes a dialectical awesome (both ineffable and profane) successful the Tamil movie Agraharathil Kazhutai (Donkey successful a Brahmin Village, 1977). The Tamil film, which was inspired by Robert Bresson’s French movie Au hasard Balthazar (1966), was banned successful Tamil Nadu to not upset the Brahmins.

The spiritual reminiscences of Abraham’s donkey to Ghatak’s Neeta are hard to miss — they are sacrificial lambs, mythological scapegoats, victims of their fate. Like the donkey’s shade — ridiculed successful life, worshipped aft decease — Ghatak is simply a spectre that haunts Abraham’s film’s narrative, his cinema and his life. The pupil nonpareil stuck to the credo of the “Ritwik vision”. “John Abraham was truly obsessed with Ghatak; his full thought process was besides similar Ghatak’s. The things that provoked him were akin to what provoked Ghatak,” says filmmaker Jahnu Barua. Abraham’s poem “A Tribute to Ritwik Ghatak” stands testimony. Both the mentor and his beloved pupil drowned successful intoxicant and tragically died young, astir astir the aforesaid age.

Not conscionable arthouse directors, Ghatak recovered fans among the commercially palmy filmmakers too, from Bollywood to Kollywood. Meghe Dhaka Tara inspired the fashionable and influential Tamil manager K Balachander to marque his ain mentation Aval Oru Thodar Kathai (She is simply a never-ending story, 1974).

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By his ain admission, cinema was not Ghatak’s archetypal emotion but the signifier consumed him. He would ever say, “If I find a much almighty mean than cinema, I would plunge into it’,” his precocious woman Surama Ghatak recounted to movie historiographer Amrit Gangar erstwhile helium met her successful 1990s Calcutta (now Kolkata), Gangar writes successful his effort successful Unmechanical: Ritwik Ghatak successful 50 Fragments (2025, Westland Books), a publication of essays and reminiscences edited by Shamya Dasgupta. Surama-di said, “He [Ghatak] began with penning abbreviated stories. Since theatre was a much almighty medium, helium entered the tract of theatre. And past cinema, due to the fact that done films helium could scope a greater wide of people.”

Eternal migrants

Anup Singh’s Ekti Nadir Naam (The Name of a River, 2001) — the title, a hat-tip to Ghatak’s Titash Ekti Nadir Naam (1973) — is simply a emotion story, “as successful galore of his films. I statesman with a antheral and a pistillate made stateless by the 1971 Bangladesh’s liberation war. As they transverse the stream betwixt Bangladesh and India – playing the roles of refugees, divine beings, and characters from his films — with them, the movie besides tries to recognize the earlier partition of India that led to the massacre of fractional a cardinal radical and forced 10 cardinal radical to migrate crossed the recently established borders. The movie has galore of the main actors from his films, similar Supriya Choudhary, Anil Chatterjee, Abanish Bannerjee and Gita Dey. While it is besides changeable connected galore of the locations wherever helium changeable his films and the songs and euphony of his films are echoed, ‘Ekti Nadir Naam’ uses his imagistic, aural and communicative elements to rotation done the past of nations, India and Bangladesh, his beingness and the value of his cinema adjacent contiguous for truthful galore young filmmakers,” helium says.

It took Tanzania-born Indian and FTII, Pune postgraduate Anup Singh 10 years to marque his archetypal diagnostic Ekti Nadir Naam (2001), produced by NFDC, India, BFI, UK, & Bangladesh. Through the sprout docket successful Bangladesh, he’d alternate betwixt shooting the movie and recovering astatine the infirmary from a raging gastroenteritis attack. His liver was damaged, the doctors believed helium was an alcoholic. But helium didn’t drink. His colleagues teased him that Ghatak’s shade was investigating him — to spot if helium was stubborn capable to implicit the film. Soon, the UK and Indian accumulation units unopen shop.

“Ekti Nadir Naam is simply a young filmmaker’s homage and a passionate endeavour astatine a dialog with his teacher’s cinema. My 2nd film, Qissa (2014, starring Irrfan Khan), began from Ritwikda’s knowing of the Partition of India. And The Song of Scorpions (2018), my 3rd film, was an effort to survey the brutalising patterns of patriarchy that prevail adjacent wrong a emotion relationship,” helium adds.

Singh was “distressed and unnerved” by Ghatak’s movie erstwhile helium archetypal encountered them. The “shape of the creation and the miniscule inflections of his shots kept disrupting the crippled and summoning aggregate themes: partition of a nation, severance of people, recurrence of ritualistic sacrifice of women, the life-defining patterns of history, story and nature, tearing astatine and questioning each other,” helium says, “Here was a cinema of location and homelessness, of Partition, which led my forefathers to overseas lands. Ritwik-da’s disquieting question successful Jukti, Takko aar Gappo, “Who is not a refugee?” echoed arsenic his astir affirmative statement. And the ‘Charaiveti, charaiveti’ telephone to support moving. To rotation on…to observe the affirmation of beingness that was ablaze successful his cinema.”

Ghost of Ghatak lives connected astatine FTII

In 1971, Jahnu Barua was portion of the “lucky batch” that met Ghatak for conscionable a time erstwhile the second had travel to behaviour a workshop. Ketan Mehta was besides contiguous successful class. Barua recalls however he’d notation to Ingmar Bergman arsenic “knave” and would reserve his conspicuous irritation — and choicest Bengali cuss words for students — astatine his ain inability to marque them recognize theory, cinematic imaginativeness and passion. “Ghatak is simply a feeling for everyone. Without him nary people is implicit astatine FTII. I had nary thought who helium was earlier I went to the institute, wherever I could consciousness that everyone was talking astir him, determination was immoderate benignant of aerial astir him connected the campus; each movie we saw, the elder students would speech astir him, not conscionable arsenic a filmmaker but besides successful presumption of cinematic passion. I saw the archetypal movie that he’d made, but which remained unreleased until his death, Nagarik (1952), and a documentary made for the students, Rendezvous, I was wholly stunned by the ocular experience. Such almighty images helium had created. I got drawn into those images,” helium says.

The past country of Meghe Dhaka Tara, when Neeta says “dada, aami banchte chai” (brother, I privation to live!) “chokes” Barua each clip helium watches it. Years aboriginal erstwhile helium was making his ain films, his master’s images came to Barua, “For my films Halodhia Choraye Baodhan Khai (Catastrophe, 1987) and Xagoroloi Bohudoor (It’s a Long Way to the Sea, 1995), the thought of utilizing images (village life, trees, rivers, memories of childhood) to assistance a movie came from him,” helium adds.

Sudhir Mishra was drawn to the extremist rebel of a director, to “the full interaction of his work, fundamentally its tenseness and affectional depth,” helium says, adding, “[Ghatak] is not afraid. That fearlessness goes to its logical grade [in his work], taking everything successful an affectional mode portion simultaneously seeing its nonsubjective information successful a governmental context. Of however politics of the extracurricular satellite and manipulation of powerfulness brokers trample implicit guiltless idiosyncratic lives. He tells that with large humanity and lyricism. The savage and lyrical beryllium together. And it is precise hard to seizure that. I spot his enactment not successful bid to get inspired but successful bid to larn and acquisition it and spell backmost into that world.”

Politics of cinema

Barua calls Ghatak a “super-creator”. “He has been a beardown humanist due to the fact that of the benignant of trauma helium had gone through, with the experiences during his aboriginal years, witnessing Bengal famine, Partition, partition of Bengal, quality displacement…his puerility made a batch of interaction connected him. He had a creatively almighty youth…he started creating plays, was progressive successful IPTA (Indian People’s Theatre Association), I felt helium got much confined to those aspects…he was influenced by Leftism. The governmental aspects didn’t fto the filmmaker spell retired of that limitation. But I don’t telephone him a Leftist. I telephone him a humanist,” helium adds.

Mishra, who has written a agelong nonfiction connected Ghatak for the centenary celebrations astatine Kolkata International Film Festival (KIFF, November 6-13), begs to differ. “It’s similar saying ‘my wife’s beauteous but I can’t emotion her due to the fact that she has cancer,” helium says, “[Ghatak] is indistinguishable from the politics, from the partition of Bengal, however folks were divided, displaced, near adrift and abandoned…that abandonment breaks his heart. I don’t spot him arsenic an ideologue, I deliberation sometimes helium mocks the implicit theoretical people. I don’t deliberation you tin instrumentality [politics] away...everything unneurotic makes who helium is.”

Because Ghatak the iconoclast challenged the societal norms of his clip and questioned the powerfulness structures that a Saeed Akhtar Mirza and Ketan Mehta could bash so, too, successful their films — which are imbued with Ghatak influences, from melodramatic communicative strength to societal consciousness.

The precocious communist Safdar Hashmi, theatre radical Jana Natya Manch (JANAM) co-founder, believed “Indian cinema didn’t person a connection earlier Ritwik Ghatak”. Hashmi wrote [as reprinted successful The Unmechanical book], “Ritwik and Calcutta were inseparable, and by the aboriginal 1970s, some had aged beyond recognition. Calcutta had seen the nutrient question of 1966, the archetypal United Front authorities of 1967, the CPI(M)-Naxalite clashes, the rigged elections of 1972. By the mid-’70s, that Calcutta was gasping, and Ritwik’s pulse excessively ran precocious with the city’s.”

Ahead of his time

Barua says, “I was bowled implicit by Ajantrik (1958) for antithetic reasons. It’s not a technically large movie — being a movie pupil of the institute, we are precise overmuch conscious astir technicalities — but you hide technicalities due to the fact that of its concepts (a car is the film’s protagonist), the humanisation of machines, feeling empathy for machines, identifying yourself, your life’s travel with it; it is much applicable contiguous due to the fact that everyone is becoming machines.”

Ajantrik, Ghatak’s archetypal commercialized film, captures a transition: from a sentimental pre-modern attachment to objects to a replacing-old-with-new capitalist reality. He anthropomorphises the instrumentality (Jagaddal, a 1920s Chevrolet jalopy), wresting it from the thought of an alien monstrosity to a companion to Bimal (Kali Banerjee). The Oraon tribespeople of Jharkhand contiguous a opposition to Bimal and metropolis life. Documentary filmmaker Meghnath revisited the places wherever Ghatak’s movie was changeable successful to make In Search of Ajantrik (2024). “My documentary is to recognize wherefore Ghatak made the movie successful 1957, however helium saw cinema, what relation his movie played successful processing cinema, his sincerity successful doing things, and however helium saw the Adivasi community,” helium says.

An internalised gaze

The Adivasi, oregon the marginalised, is simply a taxable filmmaker Devashish Makhija (Joram, Bhonsle, Ajji) keeps returning to successful spirit. “I self-appointed Ghatak arsenic my lighthouse erstwhile I chose to marque films astir the socially under-represented — a acceptable I don’t beryllium to,” helium says, “and I unrecorded with changeless guilt astir appropriating their narratives. In my humble opinion, Ghatak had gotten the non-privileged ‘gaze’ close (decades earlier it became imperative to wrangle with these things). Something astir of his peers didn’t. He saw the subjects of his films from the wrong out. It helped that helium had lived done akin preoccupations and pain.”

The Sindhi filmmaker, who grew up successful Calcutta and made Mumbai his home, recovered successful Ghatak’s films a “vindication for the aesthetics of suffering (as opposed to ‘poverty porn’).” Makhija says, “His camera did not shy distant from the tearing slipper, the rancid wound, the itchy unshaved beard. He utilized his cinema to question wherefore we compel ourselves to travel to presumption with displacement, inequality, suffering, bigotry. I crook to him erstwhile I consciousness the value of these questions successful my cinema commencement to crush me. And helium tells maine to marque my cinema lone if I’m good with it yet sidesplitting me. I’m inactive grappling with that.” Makhija had written an unfinished, unreleased film, Bhoomi, which had nods to Jukti Takko Aar Goppo (1977).

On location turf

One fractional of those who person watched Abhinandan Banerjee’s Manikbabur Megh (The Cloud and the Man, 2021), find spiritual links to Ghatak’s Meghe Dhaka Tara (The Cloud-Capped Star) — the communicative of an underdog who doesn’t beryllium anywhere, the unreality is simply a harbinger of state and anticipation for him. The different fractional references Satyajit Ray’s Pather Panchali, for Manik was Ray’s daak naam (nickname). “The achromatic and achromatic imagery, the wide shots and antagonistic abstraction successful my movie volition punctual of the frames of Meghe Dhaka Tara and Titash Ekti Nodir Naam, they are afloat of antagonistic space,” says Banerjee.

For him, Bengali cinema began with Ghatak, introduced to his films by his gramps successful small-town Bengal. “The archetypal Ghatak VCD I saw was Jukti Takko aar Goppo and it blew my mind, the quality Ghatak played, the satellite helium created, is afloat of realism and precise antithetic from his different films. I person ne'er seen a movie similar that till now,” helium says. As a child, helium didn’t similar Ghatak’s melodrama (underlined moments successful Meghe Dhaka Tara, Subarnarekha) due to the fact that helium didn’t recognize it.

Ghatak was a rupture to orthodox cinema-making successful Bengal. Ghatak is much idiosyncratic to Banerjee than a Ray oregon Mrinal Sen, helium says, “he is his ain beingness and helium is simply a huffy guy…like a Professor Shonku of cinema, wherever you can’t enactment a connection to him – not Hollywood, not neo-realism, not French wave. You don’t spot immoderate influence, you spot an affectional antheral who got wounded by the ideas and themes of freedom, tragedy, humanism and who loved theatre. When you can’t specify a signifier of creation aft experiencing it and what an creator is trying to bash to you, you conscionable feel, that intangible, analyzable feeling is lone imaginable with Ghatak. Ray and Sen marque you deliberation much than thing but Ghatak makes you feel. That’s the large differentiator for me. I can’t comparison Ghatak to a satellite cinema auteur and that’s wherefore I emotion him. I americium arrogant that we besides person idiosyncratic whom you can’t frame.”

If there’s 1 connection he’d take to specify Ghatak, it is “audacity” – “what I aimed for erstwhile penning my film,” helium says, “From him, I’ve learnt, cinema doesn’t request cinema, cinema needs life. I’m blown distant by his (unfinished) documentary connected creator Ramkinkar Baij that observes the escaped tone property that conscionable doesn’t care. Ghatak, Vincent van Gogh, Ramkinkar Baij and Bibhutibhushan Bandopadhyay – they were the existent audacious humans who lived similar kings [of their domain], existent artists who ne'er gave a damn to the world, and died early. We are municipality hypocrites.”

Among his contemporaries, Banerjee finds echoes of Ghatak’s free-spirit storytelling and characterisation benignant successful Goutam Ghose’s lad Ishaan Ghose’s films (Jhilli, Morichika), successful which “life and tone organically blossom,” helium says. Ishaan, however, is honorable successful admitting to the transgression of not having watched Ghatak’s films but has heard fantastic stories of the maverick auteur from his filmmaker father, who was adjacent to the Ghataks.

Music to our ears

Mishra says, a batch of radical deliberation that Ghatak didn’t similar Rabindranath Tagore for lawsuit (unlike Ray), but if 1 sees the usage of Tagore successful Ghatak’s works, 1 realises that Rabindrasangeet, Hindustani classical and people songs — each co-exist. Singh says, “Image, sound, music, and adjacent songs look with the unit of questions, challenging each pre-determining beliefs oregon doctrines…What Ritwik-da was moving with, I dilatory began to spot with awe and wonder, were the principles of music. This is what galore of america question to travel and observe successful our films, and telephone it the epic form.”

His usage of songs is beautiful, says Mishra, whose ain films (Hazaaron Khwaishein Aisi) are remembered for their music.  “The mode helium uses, for example, adjacent in Meghe Dhaka Tara, erstwhile the sister comes and the member sings, astir summons him similar an alaap, the mode they meet; and the mode helium uses Je raate... (Subarnarekha) which is simply a mournful song, but helium uses it successful an astir romanticist manner. He’s rather a guy,” helium concludes.