2441139 - 'Chakri ta ami peye gechi Bela sunchho?' 📞

Painter and Author: Sinchan Paul

Contact: kalamkaripaintings@gmail.com

Prologue

This song (the Album's name was 'Shunte ki Chao Tumi') was released in 1994 while I was becoming an youth from adolescence. I recalled its tune, its lyrics even today as lively as back then. This iconic song by Anjan Dutta (whom I later watched couple of times performing live in festivals during my study years at the Jadavpur University) was a trend setter and despite the presence of Suman Chattopadhyay (Bob Dylan's style music in Bangla) and Gautam Chattopadhayay inspired Bangla Rock Bands, who were transforming Bangla Music forever at that time, this Song was able to move millions of Bangla speaking (and probably many non-Bangla speaking) young minds worldwide. The reasons are probably three fold: 1) a tune that penetrates the heart at the very first hearing; 2) a poem (the lyrics) that was so simple and yet meaningful to everybody; 3) the visual it creates to the audience's mind -- 'a young man desperately calls his loved one, Bela Bose, to tell her he has finally secured a job, hoping she won't go through with a marriage arranged by her family' -- an extremely common theme yet kind of passes the test of time as it touches the heart with the similar melancholy as that of the story of the Happy Prince.

This is the fourth artwork from Sinchan at the Story-telling Section of the Prodeeptika and I am publishing it for the global readership as my way of saying best wishes for 2026.

~~ Kunal Konar, The Publisher

In the frantic narrative of Anjan Dutta’s "2441139," we are anchored to a humid telephone booth and the sound of falling coins. We see Ranjan, clutching his hard-won success like a shield, desperate to stop a wedding that might already be underway. But my brush stayed focused on the other side of the wire.

I painted, Bela Bose not as a bride-to-be, but as the monument Anjan has built in his mind. He imagines her seated on the floor, tethered to the hallway by the cord of the telephone, frozen in a state of perpetual waiting. To him, she is a static soul, suspended in time until he is ready to claim her.

But as I layered the colors, I found myself asking: Is she actually there?

Perhaps the room I’ve painted is empty. Perhaps the phone is ringing in a hallway where the lights have already been dimmed, and Bela has long since stood up, dusted off her saree, and walked into a life that didn’t wait for a "stable job" to begin. The tragedy of the song isn't just the timing; it’s the possibility that Ranjan is singing to a ghost of his own making.

In this piece, I wanted to capture that heavy, liminal silence—the weight of a phone call that arrives at the exact moment the world has moved on.

• Genre/Style: Inspired by Kalighat Patachitra

• Medium: Acrylic on Paper

Artist's Profile

~~ Kunal Konar, 31Dec2025; Publisher and Promoter