The Secret Self

Being exclusive has never been an area of concern for veteran Bengali actor Suchitra Sen. Every time her name has cropped up in public discussions 8212; be it last year when Sen8217;s name emerged as a frontrunner for the Dadasaheb Phalke Award, or early this month during the actor8217;s birthday on April 6 8212; Sen8217;s singularity has kept speculation rife in India and across Bengal. Nothing, though, could drag her out from her Ballygunj Circular Road apartment where she has remained incommunicado, and possibly unmoved, for the last 29 years.nbsp;

Yet, on screen, across three decades and 53 Bengali and seven Hindi films, the actor fleshed out a stature so special that 8220;young ladies in Kolkata fashioned their personalities around her and mothers copied the suave sway of her head,8221; according to film scholar Sanjoy Mukhopadhyay.

Post-1978, when she was last seen on the silver screen, Sen moved into another realm of exclusivity, one that is intensely personal. But through speculation, Sen has always been part of the Bengali mindscape. Everything from the state of her health and mind, her graying hair, the fading of her beauty to her spiritual inclination, have been discussed and assigned in Kolkata as reasons for her forfeiting the public life.

Her nomination for last year8217;s Dadasaheb Phalke brought the conjecturing back onto the national stage. The attention that followed her roles in films like Bimal Roy8217;s 1955 classic, Devdas, Asit Sen8217;s Mamta 1966 and Gulzar8217;s controversial Aandhi 1975, resurfaced through a flurry of 8216;will she, won8217;t she8217; news reports. 8220;Even if the government had declared her name, she would not have accepted the award,8221; contends Gopal Krishna Roy. 8220;Coming out of her self-imposed exile would8217;ve meant giving up on the sacrifice of all these years.8221;

Now over 70, Roy had once belonged to a 8220;select circle8221; that had access to Sen, a relationship she allowed to continue and mature till now, as Roy says, 8220;when everything has petered off.8221; Their friendship began over an invitation to tea and led to three biographies on Sen by Roy, with a fourth on the anvil. 8220;She was witty, intelligent and fun-loving. And though her last film Pronoy Pasha was a rare flop, she didn8217;t have any real competition when she went into a shell.8221;

Her career-graph as an actress possibly gave the only hint of her intention. From 1953, when the much-feted Uttam-Suchitra combine delivered the first of its many hits with Saarey Chuattor , Sen became increasingly choosy about her roles 8212; 20 films in the first three years; a mere 11 in the last ten. Married into the wealthy family of Adinath Sen in Kolkata, she had both financial security and a phenomenal run in the film industry as back-up. Towards the end of her career, Sen was reportedly charging as much as Rs 1.5 lakh per film, when full-length Bengali films used to get canned for less. Perhaps, the actress was extracting a price for the growing distance she felt from the world of glamour and greasepaint.

8220;In her films, Sen represented the nascent, new woman. Unlike predecessors like Kanan Devi and Uma Sashi, Sen essayed roles where the feudal family structure was feeble, the strong-willed woman occupied the central character,8221; says Mukhopadhyay. She carried home the persona she carried off so well on screen. An estranged relationship with husband Dinanath Sen found her moving away to her present address with daughter, actor Moon Moon Sen.nbsp;Even professionally, she maintained a strong stance. She refused Raj Kapoor8217;s offer to act in one of his films, 8220;since she never felt as friendly towards him as she felt towards Aandhi co-star Sanjeev Kumar,8221; according to Roy. Next she refused Satyajit Ray8217;s offer to act in the proposed film, Debi Chaudhurani. 8220;Ray wanted that while shooting was on, she should act exclusively for his film. She said it won8217;t be possible for her to give up on the directors who made her Suchitra Sen,8221; says former journalist and close associate Amitabhanbsp;Chaudhuri.

Despite the air of mystery around Sen 8212; her co-stars like actors Sabitri Chatterjee and Soumitra Chatterjee refuse to mention anything about her; Moon Moon and her daughters, actors Riya and Raima Sen, too, unwaveringly, maintain the family code of secrecy 8212; many attempts, have been made to prise open the mystique. The news about her varies between gross surmising 8220;she moves around in a burqa8221; to more popular estimations 8220;she leaves home at dawn and visits the hallowed Belur Math8221;.

In a city where the popularity of Bollywood actor Madhuri Dixit is often attributed to the close resemblance she has to Sen, a rare superstar of her stature comes with the right to a private life inevitably denied. Soon after she retired from films, Sen tested waters by attending a couple of public functions. She found herself swamped by an overwhelming deluge of public attention. 8220;Once at the Book Fair, thousands of people gathered to see her,8221; remembers Chaudhuri. 8220;It got so bad that we had to seek shelter in the office as the crowd clamoured outside.8221;

Things came to a head when about a decade ago, an over-enthusiastic press photographer shot Sen at a queue, reportedly waiting to cast her vote. The photograph that made its way to the front page the next day found her looking 8220;very unlike her,8221; according to Roy. Possibly, she cringed. Possibly that is what made her recoil even further from the public stare.

This year, when a local Bengali channel aired a programme on computer simulated imagery that tried to imagine Sen at 75, it was merely attempting to fill a physical void.

A few relics remain. 8220;Take a look at this carefully,8221; says Roy, after digging out a photograph from within his collection of books. It8217;s a badly-printed photograph in soft-focus, showing a smiling Sen helping with the makeup of her daughter, Moon Moon. 8220;This is 1980, during Moon Moon8217;s wedding. It is the last time Mrs Sen willingly posed for a camera,8221; Roy adds.

The most plausible explanation for Sen8217;s silence comes from her inclination towards spirituality. Around 1972, she received dikshya at the Ramkrishna Mission. Her personal photographer, 75-year-old Dhiren Dev, is happy that Sen is where she can8217;t be reached. 8220;She is practically dead to the world. She is beyond money, sex, love, fame and she is above all provocations. She lives with her spirituality,8221; says Dev.

In office, having lived through the story, something inexplicable leads me to dial the eight-digit landline number, expecting her maid, the only other occupant in the house, to rebuke me for having the cheek to call. Someone picks up the phone. 8220;Hello?8221; asks the voice, dimmed and cracked by age, quivery at the edges. But there8217;s also a hint of cheerfulness. 8220;Can I8230;Mrs. Suchitra Sen?8221; I manage to mutter. A sound 8212; 8220;uaw?8221; Click. Silence. I don8217;t call back.