Have you ever missed someone you have never met? Wished that
you were around the person for at least sometime, so that you had tales to tell
to the next generation? And also pondered over the simplistic achievements of
the earlier era and hoped that even a percent of their goodness was imbibed in
you?
My relation with my grandfather is a culmination of the
feelings above. He was from Bikrampur, Narayanganj. Tall, fair, dhoti-half
shirt-shoes clad, expletives-speaking, stereotypical "bangal" of early
1900s, started his career in 1936, crossed the border in 1948 with my beautiful
grandmother in tow as refugees. Grandmother herself was from Rangoon (Burma), moved
to Dhaka during World War II, married and shifted to India with her husband. Their
refugee certificates state them as East Pakistan residents.
Amongst the new professions of that period, my grandfather
was a photographer. He learnt the art in Doss company (Azimpura, Dhaka). With
the early horizontal black-box cameras and a few years of employment in Doll
Studio (Park Street, Kolkata), he visited Burnpur for Industrial photography,
following which the family shifted to Burnpur and opened the first photography
studio in the small steel city.
I have heard innumerable anecdotes from Baba about his
skills, the small shop with tin roof, his tools (one of the antiques still
exist within the family) and the rented house where they stayed for 42 years!
My initial memories also revolve around that house, where even I have stayed
for the first few years of my life.
The feelings were rekindled recently when Baba was
discussing the announcement of the discovery of the Higgs Boson. Satyendranath
Bose's 1924 research that created the Bose-Einstein Statistics, build the
foundation for Bosons. Bose did his research in Dhaka and grandfather was his personal photographer.
Baba still has the certificate given to grandfather by Bose, amongst the
various other memoirs.
Grandfather's skills were not restricted to Bose. He had
accompanied General Ayub Khan (later president of Pakistan) for three months in
his camps. Manipur's Raja-Rani had offered him to move to the state after
seeing his work. He had clicked Sharmila Tagore's childhood pictures, when her
dad was posted in Asansol Railways. Asha Pareekh's bengali-style saree clad
picture, and bit of still photography work with Meghnad Saha (as assistant still
photographer) and photographer in Eastern Talkies is also in his list. And
finally Nehru, when he visited to inaugurate Mython Hydroelectric plant (DVC).
The list goes on, and I remember this few.
His good nature and professionalism is what people remember him by. Sadly, the small shop he had opened up burnt down and most of his works extinguished with it. Baba had to rebuild the venture from scratch, a loss he regrets till date.
His good nature and professionalism is what people remember him by. Sadly, the small shop he had opened up burnt down and most of his works extinguished with it. Baba had to rebuild the venture from scratch, a loss he regrets till date.
Such times bring such a hollow feeling, an indefinable
emptiness, to reach out and live the un-missed moments, get pampered for a few
years, just to be able to recount the love, affection and simplicity of the
person who passed on his genes to you. Wish he had known that his granddaughter
will be on her way to the world! Lots of struggle and ups and downs later, he
gave in to his health at the age of 51, ensuing another life of struggle for
Baba, who was just 17 then. Well, that is another story altogether :)
The professional success of the period was more towards
sustaining families. To pull through the emotional and financial burden of
leaving everything behind and begin afresh in a new country. The unsung heroes,
the common man, faded away to obscure corners of the hearts of family members. The
dedication of the genre of that age was so profound, their art and intelligence
was several strata above what we can ever imagine to possess. Hats off to what
we call the older generation.
I have promised myself to visit Dhaka (and Bikrampur) at
least once in this lifetime, as an ode to the man I am proud to call my grandfather.
All I can say about him is that the yearning is going to live and die with me -
the remorse of never having seen him and the complaint against God, for taking
him away so soon! I guess even He wanted some nice portraits to be clicked :)
