Greatness Thrust Upon Him: Remembering Rahul Arunoday Banerjee: Parag Biswas

In William Shakespeare’s immortal romantic comedy, “Twelfth Night,” Malvolio had said: “Some are born great and some have greatness thrust upon them.”

The popular Bengali film, TV and OTT actor Rahul Arunoday Banerjee, who died at the age of 43 after a tragic drowning incident at Talsari beach in Digha while reportedly shooting for a TV series, belonged to the second category.

There is an age-old Latin aphorism, “De mortuis nil nisi bonum,” which when translated into English means, “Nothing but good should be spoken of the dead.”

However, this aphorism doesn’t in the least apply to my 19-year-old association with this thespian par excellence, whose premature demise has shocked the entire nation.

The Kolkata-born actor, who made his first stage appearance at the age of three in “Raj Darshan,” a production staged by his father Biswanath Banerjee’s theatre group, “Bijoygarh Atmaprakash,” was so good a human being that you do not need to add an extra word in his praise as you pay homage to his departed soul.

First as a journalist and then as a film and TV actor, I had the wonderful opportunity of working with Rahul and to know him both as an accomplished artist and an exceptionally good human being from very close quarters.

My association with him began in 2008, when he had come to Siliguri to shoot for the filmmaker-turned-politician Raj Chakraborty’s debut film “Chirodini Tumi Je Amar.”

I was allotted the assignment by my newspaper house to interview him for our Friday supplement.

After I fixed an appointment with his production manager for an exclusive interview at the hotel, where the entire film unit had put up, I arrived at the hotel lounge at 5.00 pm.

As I was seated on a sofa at the lounge, I could see through the corner of my eyes a young and very ordinary man in his mid-twenties, dressed in a grey t-shirt and a black trouser, alighting from the lift to my right and walking towards me.

I could instantly make out that it was Rahul and though it was just 5.08 pm he apologized to me smilingly for being late.

As he sat down in a chair before me, he shook hands with me and said, “Sorry Dada I kept you waiting. Actually I was caught up in a script session with our assistant director.”

After an exchange of some pleasantries, I quizzed him on various aspects of the film he was shooting for and about his role in the film for over three quarters of an hour.

It was the fourth film of his life and he said that he was feeling very excited about it as he was acting in a lead role for the first time in his 13-year-old film-acting career.

Unlike many actors, who are on guard or work-mode during interviews, Rahul was remarkably open and engaged and shared his genuine passion and personal life lessons, moving beyond standard promotions.

When I left the hotel lobby that day after completing a one-of-its-kind interview during my 19-year-long career in journalism, I could hardly imagine in the wildest of my dreams that we would become so close to each other in the coming years.

The film “Chirodini Tumi Je Amar,” which was released a few months later on Independence Day that year, turned out to be an all-time blockbuster romantic drama in Bengali cinema. It ran for 25 weeks, revitalizing a moribund Tollywood industry with a teenage love story that combined emotional drama with rural settings of north Bengal and making Rahul a superstar overnight.

The abrupt and immense transformation from an ordinary man to a celebrity brought sudden fame, power, and wealth to him, but Rahul remained the same ordinary actor, never flaunting his celebrity status.

When I interviewed him twice in 2012 and 2013, it was the same Rahul whom I had interviewed in 2008. I never had the feeling that I was talking to a superstar of Bengali cinema – an actor, whom millions loved and admired.

By 2015, I had become very close to him, but our actual journey together began in April that year, when on a rainy evening a renowned production company of Kolkata informed me over phone that in mid-May the same year they would shoot a few episodes of their upcoming TV series, in which I have been selected to play the role of a tea-stall owner in the terai regions of the Darjeeling hills.

As I had already been producing, directing and acting since 2006 in short films and music videos of our own production house, We Feel Creations,” I immediately agreed to their offer.

When I reached the shooting spot I saw Rahul, who was playing the protagonist in the series. He instantly recognized me and said, “Ah Parag da. How are you? It will be great fun to work with you.”

We shook hands and started the shoot, which lasted for five days.

Both during and after the shooting everyday, while the other star actors of the unit would retire to their suites after giving their shots and maintained a distance from other members of the unit, Rahul would chat with me and another co-actor at the shooting spot in between the shots or in the evening on the hotel terrace after the day’s work was over.

One fine morning during the shooting, Rahul wanted to have egg curry for lunch but it was not available at the hotel or the few small restaurants around the hotel as it was a remote location tucked away in the jungles of the Dooars.

A senior member of the local production team and my better half, Mrs Dipika Biswas had to then cook it for him and carry it all the way from Siliguri to the shooting spot in the jungles of Malbazar – a distance of about 110 kilometers – to satisfy his sudden urge for the dish.

Rahul ate the curry extremely relishingly, savouring every bite of it with child-like enthusiasm and intermittently thanking Dipika for the “wonderfully cooked” dish.

The child, the man, the actor, who won millions of hearts with his versatile acting and down-to-earth nature, will never again return to love us and entertain us.

E.O.M.