‘MOST OF RAYS LETTERS ARE STILL UNPUBLISHED’

Interview with Debasis Mukhopadhay.

The Statesman 4th February 2022.

Debasis Mukhopadhyay : A Life in invocation of Ray

Only for the sake of passion once a young man from a small town of Bengal left a secured Railway job to embellish his soul with ray of his life ,Satyajit Ray.

In next few years his passionate curiosity to archive creative work of Ray resulted astonishing re-emergence of so many lost gems that Satyajit Ray himself started calling Debasis Mukhopadhay“ my compendium”.

His vivid and systematic research excavated lost short stories, articles, film synopsis, commercial illustrations, book cover, stage design and many more works of Ray about which the master himself was in oblivion. The spectrum of Ray’s world will always remain indebted to a man named Debasis Mukhopadhay.

An Interview by Somen Sengupta

Q - How and when the idea of archiving Satyajit Ray actually invaded you?
I got introduced to Ray’s world in 1971 when I watched his film Pratid wandhi. Soon I read his book “ Badshahi Angti “ – These too experiences reshaped my idea of contemporary Bengali culture.
Few years as a student of library science I took an academic project of making bibliography of books written by and on Satyajit Ray. From there I literary got intoxicated with Ray.
The magic spell was so strong that after the studies I continued the job out of my passion.

Q - Did you meet him at that stage ?
A- Once only.
I shown him my work. An amazed Ray admitted that he himself was not aware of many things.
I was also not conscious that the work I was doing had a value – I did it out of sheer passion without any financial benefits. It rather caused domestic altercation with my father.

Q- By when you started realising that your work is important ?
A- From 1978 for the sake of collecting more information on Ray I was meeting people like Chidananda Dasgupta, Leela Majumdar, Nalini Das, Radha Prasad Gupta etc.
Once Nalini Das told me that when Manik was student of Kala Bhavan of Shantiniketan he used write short story in English and some of those were published in newspapers.
This information moved me from inside as I earlier read many places that Ray himself saying his first write up was published in The Statesman in 1948 and it was an article titled “ What is wrong with Indian Films” .
Ray was very careless in preserving his own work and recognitions.
He hardly had any organised document filing of his work and by then many of his work were lost and forgotten form people’s memory.
I rushed to Shantinikentan Kala Bhanvan to check his date of admission and date to release and based on that started searching old newspaper files.

Q – But still you had no clue – Almost nothing .
A – I first scanned old The Statesman issues vividly.
Checking every page of the old paper of that period I found nothing.
In those days there was no facility of mobile camera, copy machine even a decent place to surf the old pages except national library – After suffering endless pain and difficulties I found nothing in The Statesman.
Then I started checking old files of Amrita Bazar Patrika and to my extreme surprise I indeed found out a full page short story published on 18th May 1941 named “ Abstraction “ by one S.Roy. The story was printed with illustration by Saila Chakroborty.
By scanning more old files I found another story published in the same paper on 22nd March 1942 by the name “ Shades of Grey “ written by S.Ray.
So one was written by S Roy and other was by S Ray – I was almost confident that these two are written by Satyajit Ray.

Q- Did you inform Ray immediately that you have found a lost gem ?
A – Not immediately – In 1981 I read Ray in an interview with a Bengali magazine has again mentioned The Statesman article as his first published work – Reading that I wrote him a letter asking his comment on that.
To my extreme surprise he replied to me through a letter dated 17th June 1981 and clearly confirmed that both these stories are indeed written by him.
So overnight earlier narrative was aborted.
After this Ray always used to mention this stories as his first work with an acknowledgement of me for finding these.

Q – It was the time you became close to him and started meeting him frequently
A - In fact I became very close to Sandip Ray that is Babuda.
Everytime coming across with a new discovery of Ray’s work I used to show that to Babuda and he very enthusiastically used to take me to Ray. Soon he himself started entertaining me in person and over telephone.
Relation turned so cordial that he personally started asking me to come in his set and started gifting his every new book published – It motivated me to gather courage and inspiration to study his life and work more vividly.

Q – Did he offer you any help in this work of archiving Ray ?
A – Yes – Such was his kindness that when he came to know that many persons and institutions are not co-operating with me in cultivating documents and information he himself issued me a letter of introduction in Bengali under his letter head in his own hand writing. It clearly stated that I am working on him and any help rendered to me will help him as well.
This letter became a golden passport to me to access many famous people and rare documents utility of which I have included in my work.

Q- Apart from his first two short stories did you salvage any other rare work of Ray about which he himself was not aware ?
A- Many I must say.
One was an important article published in The Statesman titled “ National Style In Film “ in 1949 . It was completely lost before I found it in old file of The Statesman.
I also found several old and forgotten articles of Ray from Desh, Betar Jagat, Chalachitra and Amrita Bazar Patrika.
Many of his outstanding commercial illustrations for advertisement were not kept by him. Myself following his style of sketch and brush strokes started matching those in old newspaper files and getting them approved. All these were done by him as an employee of DJ Kemar & Company where he worked for years.

Q- Was there any such discovery that indeed unbelievable ?
A- Ray as one of the founder member of Calcutta Cine Club used to write a short synopsis of many foreign movies for the members before it’s private shows. This used to help people to understand those movies better.
No one ever thought that those are priceless for world of cinema.
When I came to know this I spent several hours in Calcutta Cine Clubs old records and file.Finally found some of the finest write ups of Ray on various foreign movies. These all were gathering dust inside of old files of the club.

Q - How come his connection with stage was explored by you.
A – In 1951 Ray did stage design and booklet cover for a Bengali play named “ Tapati “ directed by noted actor Bikash Roy.
Ray gifted me a photograph of the set design and a copy of that booklet. He told me that it was 1945-46 when he did this work. He even said the same thing in an interview with Anandolok magazine. Myself by searching old newspaper files found evidences that it was not in 1946 but in 1951 when this stage design was done by him.
His joy was endless when he checked the fact through my research.

Q – Was your hard work used by others , with or without acknowledgement ?
A- My experience is mixed in this.
In 1987 when Shyam Bengal was making a documentary on him , Satyajit Ray called me and asked some of his illustrations done in commercial advertisements. I had all dates of those publication in newspaper.
Collecting those from me Ray rushed to national library and photographed many of those and Shyam Benegal used those.
So was done by Goutam Ghosh with whom I worked for hours while he was doing documentary on Ray.
In 1992 just before and immediately after of his demise “Desh “ magazine came up with two matchless issues covering an extensive documentation of his cinema, music, editorship, and literature with all details of it’s release, cast, awards won in aborad, books written on him, various cine reviews of Ray’s film in foreign journals etc.
It was prepared by me and my name was given there though at that point of time I was an employee of a rival newspaper. The same list later copied multiple times by people in many periodicals and books but no one did mention my name.
It pains me a as hard work of mine over decades are now copied in moment without any acknowledgement.
At one point Ray started calling me as his compendium and used to refer my name to anyone who had a wish to work on his life. There was an incident worth mentioning here.

Q – What was it ?
A – In 1985 Ray was about to travel to Venice for receiving an award named “ Headless Angel “ meant for an overall contribution to world cinema.
Just before of his departure I prepared a list of all award he had received in his entire career till then and in that I mentioned a “Critic award” won by his film “ Nayak “.
Ray did not believe me and said he never won such an award for Nayak. Then I had shown authentic source of the information and he was overjoyed and very thankful.

Q – How did he react when every time a new unknown work of him is revealed by you ?
A – He used to approve it with a joy of a child – With high delight and even emotional expression.
In 1990 from the pavement of college street I found a book published in 1941.The cover of the book and illustrations had clear touch of Ray’s style of work and by opening it I found his name as cover designer.The book was named “ Chatu Babur Chata “ by Kamakshi Prasad Chatterjee.
I ran to studio where Ray was busy shooting his last film “ Agantuk “. As soon as I handed over the book to him he had an innocent sign of delightfulness , thanking me several times he said with an impish grim “ Did not done bad – Is not it ? “.
That was the moment when my friend Hirak Sen took a photograph, my only one with Satyajit whom I have been meeting for years.
I had spent so many years with him closely but never thought of taking photograph with him – Such was my cordiality and access to Ray.

Q – Did he ever give you anything that you consider a matchless gift ?
A- Apart from gifting me many books, periodicals, photographs and memorabilia of his own he once had given me a special audio cassette made by NFDC that contained theme music, and rare audio clips of actors and director of “Ghare Baire”.
This special cassette was made with limited edition and meant for foreign cine-journalists who were expected to watch the movie. Ray gifted me a copy of that signed by him which was not meant for common people in India – It was just priceless.

Q – Do you think many of Ray’s creative sides are still unexplored ?
A – Yes – I am at the age of 67 still working on those.
This year I have written an article after years of research showing Ray’s connection to theatre.
We do not know that after Tagore , Ray was a master letter writer and used to write lot of letters. Most of those are still unpublished and a study is needed to explore a new side of Ray .

Q- Do you have any regret of missing a chance of work which would have been a great documentation on Ray.
A- Ray wanted a book to come up on his bibliography and he himself expressed his desire to Samik Bandopadhay on this.
It would have been based on my work. Samik could not convince management of Oxford University Press for the book – The project was aborted. I will always regret this loss.

Q – After working on Ray for so many years what gives you biggest content of mind ?
A – I am happy with small recognition.
Before me no one thought that Satyajit Ray is a rich subject beyond his cinema and every single touch of his creative mind has paramount importance.
My curious navigation in world of Ray in all aspect of his life and work is now recognised as a serious work with academic values.
Let the generation come recall me only for this.

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