Remembering UTTAM KUMAR

Thirty eight years ago, the world lost Uttam Kumar, one of the most beloved actors of Bengali cinema. Born as Arun Kumar Chattopadhyay, the artiste passed away on this day in 1980 in Kolkata. Uttam Kumar was born in Kolkata at the home of his maternal uncle at Ahiritola. We stopped over at his birthplace to talk to his family members about their fond memories of the star.

Mukul Mukhopadhyay, wife of Uttam Kumar's maternal uncle, Rabindranath Mukhopadhyay, describes him as a man of extraordinary talent. “Even after being such a huge star, he was very humble and kind-hearted. He was not arrogant at all. We lost him too soon,” she says. The walls of Kumar's Ahiritola home do not have any pictures of him, as the grief is still too much to bear for his family.

Uttam Kumar's cousin, Sanjiv Mukhopadhyay, informs The Daily Star, “We miss dada particularly during Puja. He loved a local dessert shop here at Ahiritola. He used to take us there for a treat. He also loved having home-cooked tangra and koi fish.”

In the span of his career, Uttam Kumar made laudable and gorgeous screen pairs with many leading ladies like Suchitra Sen, Supriya Choudhury, Sabitri Chatterjee, Madhabi Mukherjee, Sharmila Tagore, Tanuja Samarth and Aparna Sen. Often hailed as the one-man industry, Uttam Kumar chiefly dominated Bengali cinema for three decades until his death.