Transcript
Interviewer (TM): How long has the patua community been living here?
Montu Chitrakar: I have been living here for the last fifty years, maybe more.
I was born in Nandigram, Purba Medinipur.
After getting married I moved to this place and have been staying here for the last fifty-sixty years.
No one would be able to narrate the history of patachitra.
No one knows how it all began.
My grandfather used to roam about villages, displaying patas.
I also went around many places doing the same.
But even till this date, I haven’t painted a single pata.
I have deliberately never learnt painting.
I used to visit different villages to display patas.
I got a lot of things – clothes, rice, money.
After that, my wife also started making patachitras.
But of late, I have completely stopped going outside to display these.
The bag where I used to keep these is lying over there.
Interviewer (TM) : You used to visit several villages and display patachitras.
But you don’t paint anymore?
Montu Chitrakar: No.
Interviewer (TM): How old were you when you came here?
Montu Chitrakar: Well… maybe fifty.
maybe fifty.
Interviewer (TM): So you were fifty when you came to Naya?
Montu Chitrakar: Perhaps not fifty, but a little less than that.
Interviewer (TM): Did you practice patachitra even when you were in Nandigram?
Montu Chitrakar: No. I never painted.
I just went around different villages displaying them.
I used to accompany my grandfather.
We used to frequent settlements of the tribal people.
They often gave away cows.
After getting married and moving to this place, my visits to other places for this purpose started decreasing.
I barely went to other villages to display my patas.
I have got my entire family now – my wife, my son, daughter-in-law, grandson.
So, I have stopped doing all that.
Interviewer (TM): So, it seems that patuas from Purba Medinipur migrated to this place.
Montu Chitrakar: Yes.
There are patuas from Purba Medinipur.
Actually, the patuas here hail from various places –. Thekuachak, Purba Medinipur, Narayan Murail etc.
Those patuas, along with their successive generations have all settled down here.
Now we have a sprawling settlement.
You won’t find as many houses in Purba Medinipur.
The population is larger here.
Interviewer (TM): Is patachitra still the same as you witnessed years back, when you settled down here?
Have you noticed any difference in the patachitra tradition?
Montu Chitrakar:The situation has improved a lot.
Interviewer (TM) So, you are saying that the situation is better now.
Montu Chitrakar: Yes.
Earlier, we had to battle abject poverty.
I cannot explain how difficult it was.
Interviewer (TM): Did you switch over to other professions, because of this financial instability?
Montu Chitrakar: No.. I never did that.
When we were in Nandigram, we had to undergo extreme hardship.
I won’t be able to put that into words.
Things started improving once we moved here.
We gained financial stability.. We now get enough to feed ourselves.
I don’t have to undertake long journeys for displaying patas.
But I have a wheelbarrow where I keep all my things and display them in the neighbourhood.
That is merely for my pocket money.
My son often gets annoyed because of that.
He argues that I don’t need to work since he is working and can provide for me.
But then, I am still an able man.
I feel hesitant to ask my son for my pocket money.
So, I still have a wheelbarrow where I keep things and put them up for display.
This is how things are.
Interviewer (TM): What was the main theme of your pata songs?
Montu Chitrakar: I used to sing on mythological themes like the abduction of Sita,
Srimanta-Manasa,
the goddess Durga,
Manasa Mangala,
Savitri Satyaban etc.
Interviewer (TM): How long has it been since you completely quit painting patachitras?
Montu Chitrakar: Ever since childhood I have never painted patas.
Interviewer (TM): Oh! So you have never painted?
(Daughter-in-law from behind). He doesn’t paint but he knows all the pata songs.
Montu Chitrakar: Yes, I know all the songs.
Interviewer (TM): So you only sing pata songs.
Montu Chitrakar: Right.
Interviewer (TM): So you have never painted patas of social contemporary events.
Montu Chitrakar: No.
Interviewer (TM): You said that you would visit villages displaying patachitras.
So, did someone else paint for you?
Daughter-in-law: Yes, he would carry paintings done by one of us.
Montu Chitrakar: Right.
I would go to people, narrate the song and ask them to paint accordingly.
I know songs based on contemporary social events as well.
I would request a patua to paint for me. And then I would learn the song from another patua.
Interviewer (TM): Which one was done first? Did you first compose the songs and then ask someone to paint?
Montu Chitrakar: I composed the songs first.
Then, I would narrate how it ought to be painted.
S/he would paint likewise and give it to me.
Interviewer (TM): But the way you imagined a song would be different from the way how someone else would envision it.
Can it be the same?
Montu Chitrakar: Of course, it cannot be the same.
There would always be differences, certain mistakes as well.
The painter would just blindly follow the literal meaning but won’t know all the nuances.
He wouldn’t know how to structure it properly.
After some time, he would claim that his work was done.
But when I would go through his painting,. I would notice all the missing details.
The painter would simply state that he had forgotten.
But how would I be able to sing, without that particular detail? I would need to furnish the pata with all of them.
Right? Suppose there was a pata on the goddess Durga.
But, in one frame, the image of Durga was missing.
If I cannot show Durga there, how would. I then structure it? The narrative would collapse.
Interviewer (TM): You have displayed patachitras and have sung songs.
Which kind of patachitra do you think has a higher value in the market?
Montu Chitrakar: You mean the songs?
Interviewer (TM): Be it the songs or the paintings, which one do you think is more in demand?
Montu Chitrakar: I always preferred singing about the abduction of Sita. People also loved listening to that.
Then again, when I learnt the pata song on the conspiracies of an evil stepmother, people started appreciating that too.
Interviewer (TM): Who taught you these songs?
Montu Chitrakar: My wife (Baharjaan) taught me.
She knows all these songs.
Interviewer (TM): She said she had learnt all these from her maternal uncle.
Montu Chitrakar: Yes.. And I learnt it from her.
Interviewer (TM): Do you think your next generation would carry on with the tradition of patachitra?
Montu Chitrakar: What can I say about this? What would an old man do?
Interviewer (TM): It’s not about you.. It’s about what you believe.
Do you think that your family members would carry on with this?
Montu Chitrakar: I have sons, daughters-in-law, grand-children.
It’s up to them to decide if they want to carry it forward or not.
Even if I were to ask them to, they wouldn’t listen to me.
If I start dictating to my daughter-in-law, if I start telling her what to do and what not to do,
would she listen to me?
She would obviously do what she likes.
Interviewer (TM): Let us discuss religion a bit now.
I have heard that since you painted Hindu deities, you were ostracized even by some members within the Muslim community.
Montu Chitrakar: No… Let me share an incident with you.
I went along with my uncle to make an idol of the Hindu goddess Durga.
There was a temple which needed renovation.
All the masons were Muslims.
A gentleman came and showed us the portions which were peeling off.
The mother of the owner told us to stop right there,
and when we asked why, told us that the gentleman was a Muslim.
(snorts)
When I was about to say that we too were Muslims,. I was asked by my uncle to remain silent.
When he left, the lady walked in and asked her niece to bring a pail of cow dung and water.
The area had to be cleansed because a Muslim had stepped in.
She was not aware that we were Muslims, too, and she let us proceed after her cleansing.
My uncle and I were working and giggling.
My Muslim name is Montaaz.
But people call me Montu.
Interviewer (TM): So you have a Hindu name to conceal your Muslim identity.
Montu Chitrakar: Yes. My uncle’s real name is Ismail but he is called Gurupada.
Interviewer (TM): Gurupada Chitrakar? The one who lives here?
Montu Chitrakar: No no… Not this Gurupada.
He is my relative.
My uncle’s pseudo name was also Gurupada.
Coming back to the story, the old lady says to us –
we don’t eat animals hunted for game, that which is not halal,
and the lady’s son had hunted three ducks with a gun –
the old lady said that the masons were lucky because there was meat for lunch.
My uncle was worried about how to handle the situation.
I asked him not to worry.
We wander about villages.. We aren’t that stupid.
I said that I’ll devise a plan to stop them from feeding us the meat.
I said that we are strict vegetarians, and do not consume any kind of meat.
The old lady seemed pretty surprised.
She asked if we followed the Vaishnavite tradition.
I nodded.
After that, she didn’t offer us any meat.
Interviewer (TM): Pata songs have been handed down by your forefathers.
Now, while singing, have you noted any revision in the lyrics or the tune of the songs?
A change can be discerned in the tune.
Montu Chitrakar: Earlier, we used to narrate the songs in a more rhyme like manner.
But now the end notes are stretched.
Interviewer (TM): Is there any song which you can claim to have composed all by yourself?
For instance, you have learnt the mythological patas from your wife, or perhaps learnt a few others from someone else.
Montu Chitrakar: No, I have learnt everything from others.
Interviewer (TM): So, everything has been learnt from others.
Montu Chitrakar: Yes, everything.
I learnt one song from my father.
I heard patuas sing and picked up the tune and lyrics from them.
My memory is fine but I am slow in picking up tunes.
I require fifteen days to learn a song while others probably take just a day.
I tend to forget things these days.
I would keep forgetting the lyrics and would ask others to help me out with it.
This process keeps on repeating,
with me asking different people, ‘What comes after this lyric?’
This is how I learnt the pata songs.
I know around seven to eight pata songs.
I have been singing these songs all through.
But once I learn them, I do not make a single mistake.
Not a single word would be wrong.
I still have all my patachitras stored away.
Interviewer (TM): How did patachitra begin? What do you think?. Can you please trace its history?
Montu Chitrakar:This is a question that no one would be able to answer.
How it began, who was the first to begin – questions like these can never be answered.
Even my grandfather could not have answered this.