An Exploratory Study of the Portrayal of Environmental Issues in Films Analysis of Ritwik Ghatak’s Soul Searching Film Titash Ekti Nadir Naam

In our present day global village the mass media plays an important and powerful role in highlighting environmental issues and creating awareness among the public. Today several important environmental concerns demand our attention worldwide. In the multimedia scenario, film is an audio visual medium which has a powerful influence and transformative power on the audience. Films can be categorized into documentaries, feature films and short films. Documentaries have focused on diverse issues, ranging from pollution, global warming, droughts, famine to mass species extinctions and resulting social issues. They lay out how these issues could pan out in future to spell disaster. Bengali feature film maker Ritwik Ghatak stands out for his soul searching cinema. In his film Titash Ekti Nadir Naam , (A river called Titash,1973) he portrays the angst and agony of the ordinary fisherfolk as they grapple with the water crisis for no fault of theirs. Ghatak uses the river itself as a character, a metaphor, and a vehicle for the storytelling .. We can see all around us it is the common people, ‘the aam aadmi’, like the fishermen, who have paid a heavy price. Their livelihood threatened by the huge dams, toxic wastes and pollutants littering water bodies, sand mining, untenable water extractions and diversions leading to falling water tables, drought, floods even as they are unable to come to terms with this so called ‘Development’, which has suddenly uprooted them from the rivers, the water bodies and a way of life they had lived from generations. Ghatak said “Civilisation never dies. It may change, but it is eternal. Where the paddy field is born on the dry river bed of Titash, there begins another civilisation.” So, for Ghatak, civilisation is eternal. Many of his protagonists in the film were in the depths of disillusionment, despair and a sense of failure, yet they had a ring of truth around them. Perhaps he is ending on a slightly hopeful note, that all is not lost, and there is yet hope for mankind if we mend our ways to not only improve the physical environment, but also the socio cultural and political environment. The message is for sustainable development and the need for preservation and protection of our water resources as they are being increasingly threatened by man. It is in this milieu that films like Titash Ekti Nadir Naam are close to our heart. They remind us of the haunting stories behind the greed of man and the subsequent ecosystem collapse.

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