Legendary screenplay writer Nabyendu Ghosh dead

Kolkata, Dec 15 (IANS) Nabyendu Ghosh, one of the most acclaimed screenplay writers of Indian cinema who penned most of the black and white era Bimal Roy classics, died here Saturday. He was 91.

Ghosh, who would be remembered for writing the screenplay of such celluloid gems as Roy's 'Devdas', 'Bandini', 'Sujata', 'Parineeta' and Hrishikesh Mukherjee's Amitabh-Jaya Bachachan starrer 'Abhiman', had been unwell for quite sometime.

Ghosh had directed the cerebral 'Trishagni' in 1988 starring Nitish Bharadwaj, Pallavi Joshi, Alok Nath and Nana Patekar.

'The end came at around 12.30 a.m. Saturday at the Calcutta Medical Research Institute (CMRI) hospital,' his daughter Ratnottama Sengupta told IANS.

He died of cardiac failure after having remained on ventilation for several days.

Ghosh, whose wife died in 1999, is survived by two sons and a daughter.

Born on March 27, 1917, the legendary screenplay writer was a postgraduate student of English in Patna before he came to Kolkata after independence in 1947 and devoted himself to literature completely.

In 1944, he lost his government job during the British era for his book 'Dak Diye Jai' during the Quit India Movement.

After the partition, he as in Kolkata for a while before he joined Roy in Mumbai.

Ghosh, who had penned about 80 screenplays, had also worked with Mukherjee, Satyen Bose, Guru Dutt, Raj Khosla, Shakti Samanta and Prakash Mehra.

He even did bit roles in several Roy films, including 'Teesri Kasam'. He had also acted in rib-tickling Kishore Kumar-Mala Sinha starrer Bengali comedy 'Lukochuri' (Hide and Seek).

Ghosh was a receipent of Bankim Puroshkar, the highest literary award of Bengal, for his Bengali book 'Chand Dekhechilo'.

He left behind several unpublished books. Some of his recent titles were 'Bichitra Ek Premgatha' (A Strange Love Story) and 'Jibaner Swad' (The Flavour of Life).

Deeply inspired by the tenets of Buddhism, Ghosh had directed 'Trishagni' (The Sandstorm) in 1988, a film dealing with love, lust and renunciation.

In his long career as screenplay writer, Ghosh proved that he was equally at ease with Bimal Roy's school of filmmaking as well as Bollywood potboilers. He had scripted several successful Hindi commercial films like 'Raja Jani', 'Loafer', 'Dil Ka Heera' and 'Sharafat'.