It came as a huge surprise when a film archivist looking for movie posters at a scrap shop suddenly came across a treasure trove of extremely rare photographs of music legend
Ravi Shankar along with some musical notes penned by the late sitarist.
SMM Ausaja, the film archivist recently received a call from a scrap dealer in Mahim, Mumbai and he handed him a suitcase which belonged to a musician.
In the suitcase, Ausaja also discovered a poem written by the revolutionary filmmaker
Ritwik Ghatak. “The most sensational discovery was Ritwik Ghatak’s handwritten poetry with his signature. He may have had written it for Pandit Ravi Shankar, that is why it was found in the box probably. It is priceless and nobody knows about it,” Ausaja said.
“When I opened the suitcase (at home) and started going through the documents, I realised how big a part they were of our cultural heritage,” Ausaja added.
Ausaja has written two books on cinema, ‘Bollywood in Posters’ and ‘Bollywood: The Films! The Songs! The Stars!’ and treasures a huge collection of rare Bollywood posters.