It is about three and a half decades since Satyajit Ray (1921-1992) has left us. The appeal of the large body of his films remains undimmed in his native Bengal and in countries as different as US, France, and Iran. New books are being published, rediscovering him and reinterpreting his works. Much has been written about his transformative role on Indian film-making, with Pather Panchali, his first, reckoned as a trailblazer.

Filmmakers from Martin Scorsese, We s Anderson to Christopher Nolan, from Majid Majidi and Abbas Kiarostami have acknowledged their debt to Ray in unequivocal terms. Ray’s sustained relevance continues to strengthen his stature, at home and abroad. Unfortunately, in large swathes of our country, his films have hardly been seen, and he is remembered only by name. Reasons are many, like an absence of cultural sensitivities, inability to appreciate cinema’s full creative potential, and the general lack of public interest to come out of the cozy cocoon of easily available, under-nuanced entertainment. Ray never sought to discriminate between art films and the commercial ones.

Hollywood classics moved him, and he appreciated good, commercially successful Bollywood films too. Majority of Indian cine-goers did not have the occasion or interest to watch Ray films, and his works are often posited against films made to pander to the common public taste. This provides a fertile space for supercilious philistines to spread canard, seeking to gain instant publicity by denting Ray’s image. The severe indictment by one author in a rambling piece titled ‘The Dark Side of a “Classic”: Why Pather Panchali is Overrated Poverty Porn’ that gained traction in certain circles has to be seen in this context. In a country where freedom of expression is valued and where intellectual space allows even for the killers of Mahatma Gandhi and supporters of Hitler to air their views, this audacious piece should have best been ignored.

The author, like some in the past, is well within his rights to dislike and detest Ray’s first film (1955). But the insinuations go far deeper and are often based on incorrect information. Peeved, understandably, at an unsavory comparison between Pather Panchali and Dhurandhar, Sandeep Balakrishna writes that Ray transformed a literary work of considerable merit into ‘what is today known as poverty porn’, patronized by West Bengal Chief Minister (Dr. B.C. Roy) and ‘Nawab Nehru’, with a seal of approval by the West. It highlights how tax -payer’s money was spent to complete the film, the CM having being influenced by a concubine ‘whose grip over her lover was absolute’. What a baseless, defaming last sentence! However, let us stick to the facts.

It is a part of film folk-lore what risks Ray had taken and what hardships his family had to go through while making Pather Panchali – spending personal savings, taking loans, and even pawning his wife’s jewellery. After a substantial amount spent during the shooting phase, the unfinished film was shown, through the intervention of a gracious family friend, to Dr. Roy and his advisors. Impressed by the quality and novelty (except for the ending), the West Bengal government agreed to take charge and provide financial assistance to complete it. The amount actually paid was rather modest, in thousands. (Think of the huge returns the government received as producer).

Importantly, it required a Roy to spot Ray’s talent, and a Nehru to watch and, overruling objections from certain officials, send it to Cannes where it won the Best Human Document Award. The rest is history. Much before the Film Finance Corporation and later the NFDC were set up to finance meaningful cinema, the foresight of statesmen like Roy and Nehru to encourage the emerging genius should be remembered by a grateful nation. Not publicly well-known is that very few of Ray’s twenty-nine feature films deal with subjects and characters with poverty as a backdrop. The ‘Apu Trilogy’ is a human saga, of nobility and hope, and of indomitability of the human spirit. To describe Pather Panchali as peddling poverty may be appealing to a one-eyed cyclop, but by that yardstick where would Saratchandra and Premchand be placed?

It is also worth remembering that the film was received enthusiastically, and acclaimed critically, when it was released in Calcutta. It won the President’s Gold Medal for best feature film. The international appreciation, from Cannes and thereafter, came after its initial success in the home-turf. The author has alluded selectively to Truffaut and NYT’s film-critic Bosley Crowther and a few others who were initially not impressed by Ray’s first film Truffaut’s comment ‘I don’t want to see a movie of peasants eating with their hands’ was facile, and understandably, he was later embarrassed for this remark. Also, moved by the success of Pather Panchali, Bosley Crowther reviewed the film a second time, and revised his opinion for the same NYT.

The film’s hold on human imagination, on a local and global scale, continues to expand, even seven decades after its release. Finally, insinuating a lady of noble traits, hailing from an aristocratic Brahmo family, who facilitated Dr. Roy watching the incomplete work and rendering a great public service, in a language that only exposes the class and political inclination of the author, has reduced the piece to a level so crass as to make it irredeemable. At a time when certain political formations in the country seem to be in a competitive mode about cultural aggressiveness and insensitivity, any sane advice is unlikely to yield results. But the governments in the state and the Centre cannot absolve them of responsibilities to preserve and project the legacy of the true icons of modern India among whom Ray remains a leading one.

(The writer is a retired IAS officer.)

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