Chidananda Dasgupta
Encyclopedia
Chidananda Das Gupta (family name sometimes spelled 'Dashgupta' and 'Dasgupta
') , was a Bengali
India
n filmmaker, a leading film critic, a film historian and one of the founders of Calcutta Film Society
with Satyajit Ray
in 1947. He lived and worked in Calcutta and Santiniketan
.
, Assam
, India
in 1921. In 1944 he married, Supriya Das, a daughter of Brahmananda Dashgupta, brother of poet Jibanananda Das
. His daughter Aparna Sen
is a well known actress and filmmaker. Actress Konkona Sen Sharma
is his granddaughter.
Das Gupta had a flick with politics during the anti-British Quit India movement
days of 1940s. This forced him on to jobs – teaching at St. Columba’s College, Hazaribagh, personal assistant to Prasanta Chandra Mahalanobis
at the Indian Statistical Institute, Calcutta, teaching at City College, Kolkata
, journalism, and then a plush job in advertising with Imperial Tobacco.
and Hari Sadhan Dasgupta, founded the Calcutta Film Society
. The opportunity to see the best of world cinema had a decisive impact on Ray as well as others like Mrinal Sen
and Ritwik Ghatak.
In 1959, the Federation of Film Societies of India
was set up at the initiative of Das Gupta, Satyajit Ray, Mrs. Vijaya Mulay, Mrs. Ammu Swaminathan, Robert Hawkins, Diptendu Pramanick
, Abul Hassan and A. Roychowdhury. The Federation has played a major role in the spread of the film society movement in India.
and Jibanananda Das
. He had a close association with poet Jibanananda Das during the latter's lifetime which gave him unique insights into the poetry of Jibanananda Das that is often alleged to be obscure and unintelligible.
The most famous poem of Bengali literature
, namely, Banalata Sen
by poet Jibanananda Das
has been rendered into English
by Das Gupta. It reads as follows:
and his granddaughter Konkona Sen Sharma
.
Amodini was made in 1996. It was a one hour forty five minutes family comedy
. Casting included Aparna Sen, Rachana Banerjee, Anusree Das and Pijush Ganguly, among others. A satirical Indian fairy tale, it is set in the perspective of 18th century, when traditional social customs were strictly enforced and complied. The storyline is about the exploits of a pretty and spoiled daughter of a rajah (king) who is forced to become the bride of her 15-year-old Brahmin houseboy after the man she was supposed to marry jilts her on her wedding day. If she does not marry before sunset, something horrible will happen to her; therefore she must marry the servant boy. After the ceremony, the boy is exiled and the union remains unconsummated. Years pass and tragedy befalls the rajah who loses all his wealth. Suddenly the servant boy returns, only he is no longer a servant. Now he has become wealthy and powerful enough to take the rajah's position from him. Even though by then he has married another, his former bride begs him to take her in.
. He used wheel chair to move and his voice was barely audible. However he remained active. He always dressed up in trademark cream kurta
-pyjama. His white stubble around the cheeks well passed for a French beard. It has been said that Chidananda Das Gupta was a picture of 'restraint' and 'dignity'. He died on 22 May 2011 in Kolkata after catching bronchopneumonia
brought on by Parkinson's disease.
Dasgupta
Dasgupta is a common Bengali surname in West Bengal, India. Dasguptas belong to the Baidya caste - the physician community of ancient India. They were disallowed from priestly duties since they were in medical profession and better off financially unlike the brahamins...
') , was a Bengali
Bengali people
The Bengali people are an ethnic community native to the historic region of Bengal in South Asia. They speak Bengali , which is an Indo-Aryan language of the eastern Indian subcontinent, evolved from the Magadhi Prakrit and Sanskrit languages. In their native language, they are referred to as বাঙালী...
India
India
India , officially the Republic of India , is a country in South Asia. It is the seventh-largest country by geographical area, the second-most populous country with over 1.2 billion people, and the most populous democracy in the world...
n filmmaker, a leading film critic, a film historian and one of the founders of Calcutta Film Society
Calcutta Film Society
Calcutta Film Society was India’s second film society in the city of Kolkata , West Bengal, India. It was founded in 1947, just after independence, by Satyajit Ray, Chidananda Dasgupta, RP Gupta, Bansi Chandragupta and others...
with Satyajit Ray
Satyajit Ray
Satyajit Ray was an Indian Bengali filmmaker. He is regarded as one of the greatest auteurs of 20th century cinema. Ray was born in the city of Kolkata into a Bengali family prominent in the world of arts and literature...
in 1947. He lived and worked in Calcutta and Santiniketan
Santiniketan
Santiniketan is a small town near Bolpur in the Birbhum district of West Bengal, India, approximately 180 kilometres north of Kolkata . It was made famous by Nobel Laureate Rabindranath Tagore, whose vision became what is now a university town that attracts thousands of visitors each year...
.
Early life
Son of Shantilata and Manmathanath Dasgupta, a Brahmo missionary and social worker, he was born at ShillongShillong
-Connectivity:Although well connected by road, Shillong has no rail connection and a proper air connection. Umroi Airport exists but has only limited flights.-Roadways:Shillong is well connected by roads with all major north eastern states...
, Assam
Assam
Assam , also, rarely, Assam Valley and formerly the Assam Province , is a northeastern state of India and is one of the most culturally and geographically distinct regions of the country...
, India
India
India , officially the Republic of India , is a country in South Asia. It is the seventh-largest country by geographical area, the second-most populous country with over 1.2 billion people, and the most populous democracy in the world...
in 1921. In 1944 he married, Supriya Das, a daughter of Brahmananda Dashgupta, brother of poet Jibanananda Das
Jibanananda Das
Jibanananda Das was a noted Bengali poet. He is considered one of the precursors who introduced modernist poetry to Bengali Literature, at a period when it was influenced by Rabindranath Tagore's Romantic poetry....
. His daughter Aparna Sen
Aparna Sen
Aparna Sen is a critically acclaimed Bengali Indian filmmaker, script writer, and actress. She is the winner of three National Film Awards and eight international film festival awards.-Biography:...
is a well known actress and filmmaker. Actress Konkona Sen Sharma
Konkona Sen Sharma
Konkona Sen Sharma is an Indian actress. She is the daughter of actress and filmmaker Aparna Sen. Sharma appears primarily in Indian arthouse and independent films, and her achievements in the genre have established her as one of the leading actresses of contemporary parallel cinema.Making her...
is his granddaughter.
Das Gupta had a flick with politics during the anti-British Quit India movement
Quit India Movement
The Quit India Movement , or the August Movement was a civil disobedience movement launched in India in August 1942 in response to Mohandas Gandhi's call for immediate independence. Gandhi hoped to bring the British government to the negotiating table...
days of 1940s. This forced him on to jobs – teaching at St. Columba’s College, Hazaribagh, personal assistant to Prasanta Chandra Mahalanobis
Prasanta Chandra Mahalanobis
Prasanta Chandra Mahalanobis FRS was an Indian scientist and applied statistician. He is best remembered for the Mahalanobis distance, a statistical measure. He made pioneering studies in anthropometry in India...
at the Indian Statistical Institute, Calcutta, teaching at City College, Kolkata
City College, Kolkata
City College is a constituent undergraduate college of the University of Calcutta. Established in 1881, it is one of the heritage institutions of Calcutta which played a prominent social role in the wake of the Bengal Renaissance of the nineteenth century. The college is located at 102/1, Raja...
, journalism, and then a plush job in advertising with Imperial Tobacco.
The film society movement
In 1947, Das Gupta, along with Satyajit RaySatyajit Ray
Satyajit Ray was an Indian Bengali filmmaker. He is regarded as one of the greatest auteurs of 20th century cinema. Ray was born in the city of Kolkata into a Bengali family prominent in the world of arts and literature...
and Hari Sadhan Dasgupta, founded the Calcutta Film Society
Calcutta Film Society
Calcutta Film Society was India’s second film society in the city of Kolkata , West Bengal, India. It was founded in 1947, just after independence, by Satyajit Ray, Chidananda Dasgupta, RP Gupta, Bansi Chandragupta and others...
. The opportunity to see the best of world cinema had a decisive impact on Ray as well as others like Mrinal Sen
Mrinal Sen
Mrinal Sen is a Bengali Indian filmmaker. He was born on 14 May 1923, in the town of Faridpur, now in Bangladesh in a Hindu family. After finishing his high school there, he left home to come to Calcutta as a student and studied physics at the well-known Scottish Church College and at the...
and Ritwik Ghatak.
In 1959, the Federation of Film Societies of India
Federation of Film Societies of India
The Federation of Film Societies of India was formed in December 1959. This was an association of film societies of Calcutta , Delhi, Bombay , Madras and Patna....
was set up at the initiative of Das Gupta, Satyajit Ray, Mrs. Vijaya Mulay, Mrs. Ammu Swaminathan, Robert Hawkins, Diptendu Pramanick
Diptendu Pramanick
Diptendu Pramanick was a bengali film personality from Calcutta. He was the founder secretary of the Eastern India Motion Pictures Association in Calcutta, India - a fraternity of film personnel which is an interface between the entertainment industry of eastern India and the Government...
, Abul Hassan and A. Roychowdhury. The Federation has played a major role in the spread of the film society movement in India.
Writing and translations
Das Gupta is well known for his essays and translations of Rabindranath Thakur, Manik BandopadhyayManik Bandopadhyay
Manik Bandopadhyay ; ; was an Indian Bengali novelist and is considered one of the leading lights of modern Bangla fiction. During a short lifespan of forty-eight years, plagued simultaneously by illness and financial crisis, he produced 36 novels and 177 short-stories...
and Jibanananda Das
Jibanananda Das
Jibanananda Das was a noted Bengali poet. He is considered one of the precursors who introduced modernist poetry to Bengali Literature, at a period when it was influenced by Rabindranath Tagore's Romantic poetry....
. He had a close association with poet Jibanananda Das during the latter's lifetime which gave him unique insights into the poetry of Jibanananda Das that is often alleged to be obscure and unintelligible.
The most famous poem of Bengali literature
Bengali poetry
Bengali poetry is a form that originated in Pāli and other Prakrit socio-cultural traditions. It is antagonistic towards Vedic rituals and laws as opposed to the shramanic traditions such as Buddhism and Jainism...
, namely, Banalata Sen
Banalata Sen
Banalata Sen is a Bengali poem written in 1934 by the poet Jibanananda Das that is one of the most read, recited and discussed poems of Bengali literature. The title of this lyric poem is a female character referred to by name in the last line of each of its three stanzas. A draft of the poem was...
by poet Jibanananda Das
Jibanananda Das
Jibanananda Das was a noted Bengali poet. He is considered one of the precursors who introduced modernist poetry to Bengali Literature, at a period when it was influenced by Rabindranath Tagore's Romantic poetry....
has been rendered into English
English language
English is a West Germanic language that arose in the Anglo-Saxon kingdoms of England and spread into what was to become south-east Scotland under the influence of the Anglian medieval kingdom of Northumbria...
by Das Gupta. It reads as follows:
Banalata Sen
For aeons have I roamed the roads of the earth.
From the seas of Ceylon to the straits of Malaya
I have journeyed, alone, in the enduring night,
And down the dark corridor of time I have walked
Through mist of Bimbisara, Asoka, darker Vidarbha.
Round my weary soul the angry waves still roar;
My only peace I knew with Banalata Sen of Natore.
Her hair was dark as night in Vidisha;
Her face the sculpture of Sravasti.
I saw her, as a sailor after the storm
Rudderless in the sea, spies of a sudden
The grass-green heart of the leafy island.
‘Where were you so long?' she asked, and more
With her bird's-nest eyes, Banalata Sen of Natore.
As the footfall of dew comes evening;
The raven wipes the smell of warm sun
From its wings; the world's noises die.
And in the light of fireflies the manuscript
Prepares to weave the fables of night;
Every bird is home, every river reached the ocean.
Darkness remains; and time for Banalata Sen.
Writing about cinema
Chidananda Das Gupta is best known as a film historian and film critic. He has written over 2000 articles on cinema in various periodicals. In 1957 he, along with Ray and others, started the Indian Film Quarterly. His contributions to the British film magazine Sight and Sound have permanent archival value. He has studied closely the work of his friend Satyajit Ray, and his 1980 book The Cinema of Satyajit Ray remains one of the definitive works on Ray.Awards
In 2004 Chidananada Das Gupta was honoured at the Osian Film Festival, 2004, with a Lifetime Achievement Award for writing on cinema.Filmmaker
Das Gupta directed as many as seven films, namely The Stuff Of Steel (1969), The Dance of Shiva (1968), Portrait of a City (1961), Amodini (1994), Zaroorat Ki Purti (1979), Rakhto (1973) and Bilet Pherat (1972) Of these he composed only two. These are Bilet Pherat and Amodini, the latter starring both his daughter Aparna SenAparna Sen
Aparna Sen is a critically acclaimed Bengali Indian filmmaker, script writer, and actress. She is the winner of three National Film Awards and eight international film festival awards.-Biography:...
and his granddaughter Konkona Sen Sharma
Konkona Sen Sharma
Konkona Sen Sharma is an Indian actress. She is the daughter of actress and filmmaker Aparna Sen. Sharma appears primarily in Indian arthouse and independent films, and her achievements in the genre have established her as one of the leading actresses of contemporary parallel cinema.Making her...
.
Amodini was made in 1996. It was a one hour forty five minutes family comedy
Comedy
Comedy , as a popular meaning, is any humorous discourse or work generally intended to amuse by creating laughter, especially in television, film, and stand-up comedy. This must be carefully distinguished from its academic definition, namely the comic theatre, whose Western origins are found in...
. Casting included Aparna Sen, Rachana Banerjee, Anusree Das and Pijush Ganguly, among others. A satirical Indian fairy tale, it is set in the perspective of 18th century, when traditional social customs were strictly enforced and complied. The storyline is about the exploits of a pretty and spoiled daughter of a rajah (king) who is forced to become the bride of her 15-year-old Brahmin houseboy after the man she was supposed to marry jilts her on her wedding day. If she does not marry before sunset, something horrible will happen to her; therefore she must marry the servant boy. After the ceremony, the boy is exiled and the union remains unconsummated. Years pass and tragedy befalls the rajah who loses all his wealth. Suddenly the servant boy returns, only he is no longer a servant. Now he has become wealthy and powerful enough to take the rajah's position from him. Even though by then he has married another, his former bride begs him to take her in.
Later life
As an elderly man, Das Gupta was physically impaired from Parkinson's diseaseParkinson's disease
Parkinson's disease is a degenerative disorder of the central nervous system...
. He used wheel chair to move and his voice was barely audible. However he remained active. He always dressed up in trademark cream kurta
Kurta
A kurta is a traditional item of clothing worn in Afghanistan, Pakistan , Nepal, India, Bangladesh, and Sri Lanka. It is a loose shirt falling either just above or somewhere below the knees of the wearer, and is worn by both men and women...
-pyjama. His white stubble around the cheeks well passed for a French beard. It has been said that Chidananda Das Gupta was a picture of 'restraint' and 'dignity'. He died on 22 May 2011 in Kolkata after catching bronchopneumonia
Bronchopneumonia
Bronchopneumonia or bronchial pneumonia or "Bronchogenic pneumonia" is the acute inflammation of the walls of the bronchioles...
brought on by Parkinson's disease.
Publications
- Seeing is Believing: Selected Writings on Cinema, 2008, Penguin Books, New Delhi.
- Selected Poems - Jibanananda Das, 2006, Penguin Books, New Delhi.
- The Cinema of Satyajit Ray, 2001, National Book Trust.
- The Painted Face: Studies in India's Popular Cinemas, 1991, Roli Books.
- Satyajit Ray: An anthology of statements on Ray and by Ray: edited by Chidananda Das Gupta, 1981, Film India.
- Talking about Films, 1981, Orient Longman.
- Unpopular Cinema, Macmillan India Ltd.