Pradeep Sarkar on the world of innocence in Ray’s Seemabaddha
Satyajit Ray’s works, starting from the Apu Trilogy to Charulata, have left an indelible impact on my sensibilities. But it’s a little-celebrated Ray film that has haunted me more than any other. I first watched Seemabaddha when it was released in the early 1970s. I was too young to understand its philosophical implications as it chronicles the rapid rise of a young professional at a Britain-based multinational company, but even then I was mesmerised by the way Ray narrated the story.
Ray fans will know that Seemabaddha is the middle film (the first one being Pratidwandi and the last Jana Aranya) in what has been called his Calcutta trilogy.

Seemabaddha poses a corollary problem, that of corruption creeping into the life of a well-placed young professional. At its heart is the love that develops between the protagonist, Shyamelendu and his sister-in-law, Tutul. Much of what he does is to impress his visiting sister-in-law, who can also be called his muse. He takes her out to parties, to horse races and tries to dazzle her with his urban, Westernised ways. Tutul is suitably impressed but with one act of compromise he falls in Tutul’s and his own eyes.

The strange and almost subliminal relationship between Tutul and Shyamelendu fascinated me in many repeat watches. I call it subliminal because the attraction between them is neither platonic nor sexual. It’s more than that. I tried to recreate that tension between my lead characters in Parineeta and I hope that I have been successful in that. Shyamelendu’s gradual submission to corruption is another aspect of the film which fascinates me. I hope to make a film on such a theme one day.
However, the world today has lost much of the innocence of Ray’s world, I have a feeling that such a story will come across as brutal in today’s scenario.