Looking back at Sen

life does not end, but lives of entertainers do. and with that, end their struggles, their longings and their dreams. on august 29, 2001, an insignificant news item in an entertainment journal stated that the legendary film-maker asit sen, who made dazzling films like mamta, safar, khamoshi, anokhi raat and many more, died of a cardiac arrest in his home city, kolkata.seeing the manner in which the present times were bidding goodbye to asit sen made me gloomy. i was all of a sudden seized by an overriding need to provide a superior media finale to the life of this man, to try and give a well-deserved obituary to him and make his memory come alive in the minds of people who only forget too soon the tragic film-makers who once entertained them. it was in 1973 at a film party in juhu hotel when i first met him. i was fixing a drink for myself when someone told me that asit sen wanted to meet me. he was a star director then and i had just made my first film which the film trade was raving about for being very stylishly shot. what he said to me that evening still resonates in my heart. "you're no damn director!" he said, taking a large gulp from his drink. "you know why you shoot so stylishly? it's because you have nothing to say! all you do is think of great shots, which you steal from western movies!" he got louder as he swayed from having drunk too much. "film-making is about sharing emotions, it's about pain! you've not known pain! how can you call yourself a film-maker?" i was young and vulnerable and was put-off by his arrogance. it took me many years, four flops, and great turmoil in my personal life to realise that what i called arrogance was nothing but the truth. i stumbled on my idiom of "semi-autobiographical" films after confronting pain. and i found that all significant art is built on the bed-rock of sorrow. take away the salt of sorrow from the work of any film-maker and all you're left with is empty images and a bland choreography of shots they call style. some will say it's fate, others destiny. the next time i met asit sen was 27 years later in kolkata. i was receiving an award for my last film, zakhm and it was given through no one else, but this man who had also given me one of the most valuable lessons in life. he had no memory at all of our first meeting when he introduced me on stage as his "favourite director!" and when i hugged his frail body amidst the applause, and i sensed that although he still retained some of his earlier splendour, he felt forgotten and already posthumous, i felt a deep sense of collective regret at not giving this man his due. and loudly i announced on stage that i had always felt that he was the most underrated director of india. he was overwhelmed with gratitude and mischievously said that i had made him famous all over kolkata. i suspect it must have been especially delicious for him to have me applaud him publicly, because amongst the audience were mrinal sen, rituparno ghosh, sharmila tagore and several members of the bengali intelligentsia and media. later that night, as he got drunk at the awards party, he told me that he couldn't understand how a man my age could leave film-direction. he still longed to do it. and that's the last image i have of asit da. the look of intense longing in his eyes. he sheepishly asked me, "if i come to bombay will you give me a film to direct?" it broke my heart and i lied to him. i said yes. but i knew that could never happen. despite his deep thirst to call, "start sound! action!" once again, his film career was behind him. and today when that thirst has been consumed by flames and reduced to ashes, i'm relieved to know that he is free of all longings, forever. indiatimes@timesgroup.com