Sharmila Tagore, A Relevant Artiste

Sharmila Tagore began her career with a Satyajit Ray film, went on to carve a niche in arthouse cinema and achieved stupendous success in Bollywood. In her 70s now, she’s still a relevant artiste. Hemchhaya De turns the spotlight on the superstar.

- Hemchhaya De

It was a lazy winter afternoon in Kolkata. The cream of the city’s social and cultural world had gathered at The Bengal Club, built in 1827. The audience was listening to a discussion, part of a literary festival, with rapt attention. While the panel had writers, a filmmaker, a veteran theatre and TV actor and a senior journalist, all eyes were on an elegant 70-year-old on stage. Sharmila Tagore has that effect. It’s a name that spells aristocracy in these parts: she is the great-great-grandniece of India’s most beloved bard, Rabindranath Tagore. Looking resplendent in a blue-and-pink chiffon sari, Sharmila seemed happy to talk about the cities that have meant the most to her— Mumbai, Delhi and Kolkata. Although she talked about the pre-eminence of Delhi in her life —she headed the Indian Film Censor Board for seven years—her love for Kolkata was amply evident. On her recent trip to the city, Sharmila was a bundle of energy, flitting from one lit fest venue to another, and articulately discussing books and films. She regaled literary buffs with spectacular tales of Bollywood at the Victoria Memorial. The British Raj relic was an apt setting for Begum Ayesha Sultana—as Sharmila is known in the Pataudi family—to speak about art and literature. She perfectly represents the merging of those two streams.

THE RAY YEARS

It’s a well known fact that Sharmila Tagore was a Satyajit Ray discovery; her first film being Apur Sansar, the last of the Apu trilogy, in 1959. She was in her early teens when she was selected to play Apu’s wife, Aparna, who dies during childbirth. In a memoir,