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Today is the first death anniversary of Director Basu Chatterjee. When we recall Basu Chatterjee, we remember the movies Rajnigandha, Swami, Apne Paraye, Chitchor at the first instance. When we consider all these movies, we see that they all revolve around middle class family lives. Basu went through the phases of script writer, dialogue writer, assistant director, director to producer in the film industry. Middle class Indians were the main viewers for his movies, however Basu used to make movies for common man without making calculations of box office.
Basu da was born on 10th January 1930 at Ajmer, Rajasthan. Initially he worked as assistant director for movies ‘Saraswati Chandra’, ‘Teesri Kasam’, etc. ‘Saraswati Chandra’ won National Award and ‘Teesri Kasam’ also received appreciation at National level.
After working under renowned directors Basu Da touched the sky in 1969 and directed the movie, ‘Sara Akash’. Screenplay was written by him and all the actors were new. He created ‘Sara Akash’ with Rakesh, Madhu and Nandia whereas music was given by Saleel Chaudhary
‘Piya ka Ghar’, the Hindi version of Marathi movie ‘Mumbai Cha Jawai’ was directed by him in 1972. Jaya Bhaduri and Anil Dhawan were in lead roles in the movie and music was given by Laxmikant Pyarelal. It was nicely picturized in it as to how a middle-class family and newly married couple face difficulties in small house in Mumbai and ‘Piya ka Ghar’ was very much appreciated by people. After that the movie ‘Us Paar’ with Vinod Mehra and Mausami Chatterjee didn’t get that much response.
Basu Da became popular in real sense in 1974 with the movie ‘Rajanigandha’. He himself had written the screenplay and ‘Rajanigandha’ became popular with acting by Amol Palekar, Vidya Sinha, Dinesh Thakur and music by Saleel Chaudhary. College going youngsters gave tremendous response to ‘Rajnigandha’.
Ravindra Jain gave songs in ‘Chitchor’ which became too much popular in youngsters. Once again people got opportunity to watch acting of Amol Palekar, Zareena Wahab and Master Raju. B. R. Chopra handed over responsibility of directing ‘Chhoti Si Baat’ to Basu Da and he shouldered it very nicely and successfully. The hit combination of Amol Palekar – Vidya Sinha, simple innocent story and best songs made ‘Chhoti Si Baat’ superhit.
The Basu Da made ‘Khatta Mitha’ with his own screenplay. It was produced by Romu Sippy featuring Rakesh Roshan, Bindiya Goswami, Ashok Kumar and music was given by Rajesh Roshan.
His movies ‘Priyatama’, ‘Safed Jhooth’ did not get success but ‘Swami’ received National Level appreciation. Songs in ‘Swami’ by Rajesh Roshan became popular. Acting of Girish Karnad and Shabana Azami was beautiful. However, ‘Dillagi’ with screenplay by Basu Da and acting of Dharmendra and Hemamalini as well as ‘Tumahre Liye’ couldn’t get response.
Basu Da directed ‘Manzil’ (Amitabh Bachchan), ‘Manpasand’ (Dev Anand), ‘Chakravyuh’ (Rajesh Khanna). The movie ‘Baato Baato Mein’ with Amol Palekar and Teena Munim was somewhat successful. The he created ‘Ratnadeep’, ‘Apne Paraye’, ‘Laakho Ki Baat’, ‘Pasand Apani Apani’, etc.
His movies ‘Shaukin’, ‘Hamari Bahu Alka’ celebrated silver jubilee. Young hobbies of oldies played by Ashok Kumar, Utpal Dutt, A.K. Hangal was there in ‘Shaukin’ whereas family drama ‘Hamari Bahu Alka’ was appreciated by middle class audience. ‘Chameli Ki Shadi’ with Anil Kapoor and Amrita Sing may be considered as last movie of Basu Da that received popularity and commercial success.
Basu Da created ‘Ek Ruka Hua Faisla’ for Doordarshan and his ‘Kamla ki Maut’ in 1990 was much appreciated by film critics. He was a dialogue writer for ‘Laakho Ki Baat’, ‘Hamari Bahu Alka’, ‘Dillagi’, ‘Khatta Mitha’, ‘Rajanigandha’, ‘Piya ka Ghar’ as well as he was the producer for ‘Us Paar’, ‘Baaton Baato Mein’, ‘Pasand Apni Apni’, ‘Laakhon Ki Baat’, ‘EK Ruka Hua Faisla’. He was the director of a series on Doordarshan called ‘Rajani’ played by Priya Tendulkar and it was tremendously Popular.
He also created great series on Doordarsan like ‘Darpan’, ‘Kakkaji Kahin’, ‘Vyomkesh Bakshi’. He also made Bengali moves like ‘Trishanku’, ‘Hochetai’, ‘Tak Jhal Mishti’, ‘Chupi Chupi’. He was honoured with Filmfare award in 1972 for ‘Sara Akash’ for its screenplay. He again got Filmfare for direction of ‘Swami’ in 1977 as well as for ‘Rajanigandha’, ‘Chhoti si Baat’, ‘Jeena Yahan’, ‘Kamla ki Maut’. He was honoured with Lifetime Achievement Award in 2007 by AIFA.
Basu Da created his own world by working with Bengali directors like Hrishikesh Mukherjee, Basu Bhattacharya, Bimal Roy, Asit Sen. It will not be improper if we describe is movies as clean family movies. Not only youngsters but they also attracted by all the family members of all age groups. He tried to give some message in his every picture.
His movie ‘Kuchh Khatta Kuchh Mitha’ was released in 2007, but till the time the choices of audience was changed and hence Basu Da stepped down from work. He was the teacher and guide for young directors, he also worked as a Jury for Film Festival held in 1977 at Moscow. His daughter Rupali Guha is also a director and she has created many series and programs for Doordarshan under the banner Filmkarya.
There is no doubt that Basu Da will be always remembered as a director who considered the life and choice of middle-class people.
Ashok Ujlambkar
Founder Editor, Navrang Ruperi
For More details visit: https://navrangruperi.in/about-editor/
