India is changing.I am part of that change.' One has to move with the times to stay relevant.'

The timeless Aparna Sen is Tready with yet another thought-provoking film called The Rapist. The film stars her daughter Konkona Sensharma and Arjun Rampal.

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Why did she pick such a provocative title? I wouldn't say it's provocative because it is about a rape and a rapist. I didn't want to hide that fact, she tells Subhash K Jha.

How are you doing? No health problems, I hope?

No health problems, except that I had broken my knee during the shooting of my last film, Ghawrey Bairey Aaj.

Satyajit Ray made Ghaire Bhaire in 1984.

Yes. His film and mine are both based on the story by Rabindranath Tagore. But mine is set in the present times.

The Rapist is quite a provocative title.

Well, I wouldn't say it's provocative because it is about a rape and a rapist. I didn't want to hide that fact.

The Rapist is actually your first film in Hindi?

Well, I did a Hindi adaptation of Badal Sircar's play in 2015. It was called Sari Raat. But that was a short film. So yes, The Rapist is my first fulllength Hindi feature film. The language has to happen organically. My first film 36 Chowringhee Lane had to be in English because the protagonist was an Anglo-Indian. In Mr & Mrs Iyer, one protagonist speaks Tamil and the other Bengali. So which language should they communicate in? English, right? I don't think language is an issue any more because all films are subtitled in English. Also, our kind of films are rarely seen by rural audiences. The urban-rural divide among audiences has become really sharp.

I remember you struggling to put together a Hindi project years ago.