In times of SIR, Kolkata celebrates Ritwik Ghatak’s centenary, revisits films by chronicler of Partition trauma
Times of India | 4 November 2025
Kolkata: What would
, the chronicler of Partition trauma, have made of SIR? Ghatak's centenary is being celebrated at a time when Bengal is rocked by fears of mass disenfranchisement under the Special Intensive Revision (SIR).
Many, who have long regretted the misfortune of his eight feature films being ignored by Bengali movie-goers and professional film critics during their theatrical release between 1958 and 1977, believe that there couldn't be a better time in Kolkata than now to revisit his cinema that dealt with themes like uncertainty, displacement, homelessness, exile, and loss of identity.
Satyajit Ray penned the foreword to a collection of Ghatak's writings on cinema titled "Cinema and I," where he wrote about the director's "misfortune to be largely ignored by the Bengali film public in his lifetime".
Only one of his films, ‘Meghe Dhaka Tara', starring Supriya Chaudhury and Anil Chatterjee, was well-received. "This is particularly unfortunate, since Ritwik was one of the few truly original talents in the cinema this country has produced.
Nearly all his films are marked by an intensity of feeling coupled with an imaginative grasp of the technique of filmmaking. As a creator of powerful images in an epic style, he was virtually unsurpassed in
," Ray wrote.
The 31st Kolkata International Film Festival (KIFF) is screening six of his feature films — ‘Ajantrik', ‘Bari Theke Paliye', ‘Meghe Dhaka Tara', ‘Komal Gandhar', ‘Titas Ekti Nodir Naam' and ‘Subarnarekha'. The reasons for revisiting them in Kolkata on his centenary can range from the need for new generation makers to understand how much can be accomplished without the luxury of finances to viewers seeing how makers can take creative risks in the face of all adversities.
His mastery over craft, including his use of melodrama, mythology, sound design, lensing, and songs, remains an inspiration for generations of makers across the globe.
Many others feel that the SIR backdrop also makes it a good time in Kolkata to revisit Ghatak's cinema. "Out of eight feature films, only four refer to the Partition, but as Ghatak wrote about ‘Komal Gandhar', it is the homeless shape of life that he tried to capture, not necessarily a specific Partition experience.
Revisiting the films in current scenario becomes extremely pertinent now," said Moinak Biswas, professor of JU's Film Studies dept.
According to film scholar Sanjoy Mukhopadhyay, one of Ghatak's central arguments centred not only on geographical Partition but also on displacement and dislocation. "That concern is evident everywhere now, including the Mexico border, Gaza, and even Sri Lanka. Which kind of landmarks do we belong to? We find it a terribly difficult question to answer in today's civilisation.
While Ghatak did not live to witness the protests over SIR now, his cinema raised concerns that many are dealing with now," Mukhopadhyay said.
He also mentioned the special relevance of how Ghatak's movies addressed the concept of home. "From ‘Bari Theke Paliye' (1958) to ‘Jukti Takko Aar Gappo' (1974), Ghatak tried to answer the dilemma about how to locate a ‘home' for an individual. Even Bimal, the taxi driver in ‘Ajantrik' (1958), has no home, though he stays somewhere.
In ‘Subarnarekha,' he throws open the question about the identity of a refugee. Revisiting Ghatak's cinema is now more pertinent both in the local Bengal context as well as from the larger national perspective.
I am certain that the SIR issues would have featured in his films if he were making movies now," Mukhopadhyay said.
Film society movement historian and author VK Cherian finds strong resonances today of themes of uncertainty and lack of documentation that migrants in Ghatak's cinema felt, especially among those worried about mass disenfranchisement under SIR.
"I want to highlight that the same kind of uncertainty about life plagued Abhiram in ‘Subarnarekha', a boy from a low-caste background who is adopted by the high-caste protagonist.
Many poor people in Bengal who don't have the documentation that SIR requires are now living with a similar sense of uncertainty and tension. Their agony is akin to what Abhiram felt. What's important is that Ghatak offered humane empathy as a solution to this great human tragedy that comes with the fear of rootlessness.
Revisiting ‘Subarnarekha' will reveal that such cases of fear should be treated with empathy and not political agenda," Cherian said.
However, some feel that it is limiting to discuss Ghatak just from the perspective of SIR. "Ghatak's films make us aware of the long Partition. It wasn't a one-day ‘event'; rather, it is a lived experience that continues. In the last century, especially, millions migrated across the globe and specifically in Asian countries.
Ghatak's films remind us of the continuity of forced migration of communities, its aftermath, and aftershocks.
It provokes us to reflect on the current situation of migrant labourers and the battle over citizenship. His films alert us about longer and byzantine histories of homeland, nation, people, and political tussle. It's not limited to current political contexts, although, obviously, they can be read in that light," said Madhuja Mukherjee, filmmaker and professor of film studies, JU.