ON THE EDGE: THE SUKANT PANIGRAHY ‘ATTITUDE’

Sukant Panigrahy’s hustle with life could perhaps be best understood as osmotic. He did some odd things to make life happen, and life did some course corrections to make him happening – and all of this interaction seeping across a thin diaphragm of uncertainty, always.

Or else, how else would you decode him? His phenomenon?

A boy from remote, backward Odisha with no formal training in art (or anything else) and with no direction in life turns out to become one of the most prolific, quirky, and celebrated Art Directors of Hindi Cinema. How?

I had been thinking.

I was on my way back from Sukant’s studio workshop in Mircholi village, Karjat, about 70 kilometres from Mumbai. I spent a night there, and took Sukant’s interview in a home that he has designed hands-on, out of waste collected from film sets – the Dodecahedron House.

I googled it. That’s the name of a geometrical shape – Dodecahedron, which is basically a polyhedron with twelve flat faces. The house is of that shape. When I asked him what on earth could be the reason to build a house with such a curious form – his response was simple. All our life we spend within the confinement of four walls. Maybe we can’t change the confinement part of it – but why can’t we change the number of walls? I wanted to live within more than four walls, so here is it.

Somehow, it made a whole lot of sense. But don’t ask me how.

*Up above is the house with twelve flat external faces and five internal walls.*

An upright testimonial to the fact that maybe we can’t change life as it happens to us, but we can definitely make life happening, tweaking the way we look at it.

That’s Sukant. I think what makes him tick is his rock-solid outlook of positivity, personalized logic that he uses to determine his course of actions, quirky sense of humour, and never say never again approach towards destiny.

What makes Sukant Panigrahy different is his down to earth and stoic ‘attitude’.

I will not try to explain.

I would rather narrate his story exactly like he told me, and leave it for you to opine.

“SHOULD I BECOME A RINGMASTER? OR A CLOWN?”

Whenever I look back to my early days, I find scattered reflections of what I am doing now. What seemed like a ripple then might have gathered momentum with time – as I interacted more with the world around.

The village I came from, from Ganjam in Odisha, didn’t even have a radio. I am talking about when I was just about 5 to 6 years old. I am 49 now, so that means around 45 years back.

I quite literally saw a whole new world of communication unfold right before my eyes. Some uncle brought a radio to the village, and the entire village flocked around the set. We used to listen to songs in the radio and visualize them in our minds. We haven’t seen movies. None of the modern art expressions reached there, and the existing folk-art forms have long since withered away – it’s that isolated.

You can imagine. An entire circus of life is setting up a tent right in front of me, and I am grappling to understand what should be my role in that jamboree. Should I become a clown, a crying clown? A ringmaster, maybe? This search begun quite early in my life. And then, how do you erect the tent, so that it becomes weather proof. So that is where I started asking – primarily what is my fit in the society.

Is this where I belong? Do I at all belong anywhere?

TV arrived in our village after Ms. Indira Gandhi was assassinated. That was 82, right? Awesome feeling! Entirely different kind of hold. I always used to wonder, how can such a little box contain so much – I mean it shows cricket, global news, films and what not. I remember, our family never got a TV fearing it would impact our studies, but I used to reach other people’s homes and gobble up everything I could access.

TV became my first exposure to cinematic language. How is cinema made? Gradually, during my early teenage, I started getting interested in the craft of film-making. Of course, at that point in time, I didn’t know that I would get into this profession someday. All those childhood images and quests continued to stay with me when I finally entered this world of storytelling – but that came much later.

I took a plunge in the world of cinema during a phase in my life when I would have taken up anything that comes my way. Absolutely anything.

Sukant chose to be different.

He had no apparent reason to do that. Sukant belonged to a well-to-do family, with educated, and earning members. But he was never able to accept the repetitive structure in their lives. He explains – “You have studied so hard and achieved so much – have become a doctor, a Bank Manager, but still you continue to live in the same repetitive cycle, loaded with stress.”

That made Sukant feel, come what may, he won’t do a 9 to 5 job. By his own admission, he was okay with working 24 hours a day, but that has to be his wish, not a compulsion. He will never have a boss. That was how Sukant imagined himself during post-matriculation college.

I have known a few people thinking the same. Most of them compromise, when it comes to implementation. Not Sukant.

“THE LOGICAL CONCLUSION WAS TO RUN AWAY ”

I didn’t complete class 12. I mean I did appear for the exams, but since I didn’t write anything, I knew perfectly well how my marksheet would look like. How can I take my that kind of face back home? That too for someone who scored a first-class in Matric. And now this.

The logical conclusion was to run away from home, and reach Bhubaneshwar, which was our nearest town. I built some connect with someone there earlier, so I thought I will find some work and somehow complete my graduation. I gathered I should do it on my own steam, without increasing the burden on my family.

I stayed in Bhubaneshwar for around a month, doing odd jobs, washing utensils, and mopping table in roadside eateries, reaching nowhere at all. There I experienced the lower depths of humanity. I saw how people change. Kids younger than me getting spoiled by drugs. They enticed me too. I had so many choices, I could have gone downslide any time.

Out of all my choices – I was pretty much sure of just about a couple of things; that I will never beg, and I won’t do drugs. That I will work to earn. At that point of time, never in my wildest dreams I thought I will get into the film-industry.

Survival was at stake, and that took hostage of most of my mind.

While roughing it out in Bhubaneshwar, Sukant had an inkling that his family might have traced him. That made him escape to Bombay.

Those were tough times. His everyday fell into a pattern. Roam around the streets, ask for manual work somewhere, earn enough to have food and go to sleep wherever the night allows you to lie down. Living on the streets caught up to him, and his life ceased to have any direction.

Living on the streets hurled at him all sorts of challenges, some of which he doesn’t even want to remember any more. But Sukant was determined that he will have to do something from within these conditions. What, he didn’t know.

Only one thing was for sure – that he won’t go back.

“PUT HIM IN JAIL, AND GET MY MAN OUT”

In Bombay, even if I had to join the underworld and take up murdering people as my vocation – well, I was ready for that too. That desperate.

It was 93. Post-riot Bombay. Khal Nayak was running in the film theatres then. I met kids there selling tickets in black. Many of them were just like me, even younger. I started pestering them, that even I want to black tickets, but they shooed me away.

I stuck to the place till evening, one show after another, figuring out their chain of work and command. I identified the person who collected money from them – their handler, and approached him. After continued nagging, he agreed to take me to the local don – I don’t remember his name any more. Those days, Bombay was divided among a network of dons, this one was responsible for the area around Colaba.

So, I was taken this don’s durbar. There were 20 odd people there, all registering their hajiri (attendance) and telling the don about their day’s work and collections. Mostly in Marathi, with their lingo laced with the choicest of expletives. I was just a kid, probably just over 16 then. The handler introduced me as someone pestering him for work, and wouldn’t take no for an answer.

The don asked me – huh! what is it?

I immediately spun a fake back-story – that I have committed some kind of a half-murder in Odisha and escaped to Mumbai, and now I am willing to do anything to survive. He scanned me from top to bottom and asked – how far have you studied? I responded that I have completed matriculation. He gave me a paper with a signature in it, and told me to copy it. In any case I had an artistic inclination, and since I felt my future job depended on it, I gave him an exact true-copy of the signature.

He was really impressed. He immediately told his lackies to put me in Tihar Jail the next day and get his own man out. He told me to keep signing for another person and serve his jail term – that this was my first task in his team.

I was flabbergasted. Serving time in jail wasn’t exactly the job I was looking at. But there’s no escaping him at this stage. I once again made a story that I will need to collect my stuff and come back in the morning. Fortunately, the don agreed. Maybe my feigned innocence clouded his judgement, but he told the handler to escort me out. Now this handler must have understood something from my face or body language, because as soon as we were out of the den, he told me to run as fast and as far as I can – and never come back again. He told me once you are in here, there’s no going back, so run.

I listened to him. Ran like crazy. Never in my life, before or after that, I had been so happy to follow orders.

Don’t blame me if his interview sounds like neatly structured short fiction. That’s how Sukant Panigrahy tells his stories.

I interviewed Sukant twice, and the first time, due to a technical glitch, much of it didn’t get recorded. But I distinctly remember, the plot twists were the same the next time he was telling the same story, including the pauses. I had the feeling I am repeat viewing a drama, all over again.

Hence, excuse us if his ‘reality’ comes across as a neatly crafted stories, with defined beginnings and high points and endings with a twist. That’s just his craftsmanship which he can’t avoid. Sukant has the inclination and the disposition of a storyteller.

I believe it’s as true as anything could be. Structured truth.

“THIS MUST BE MY AFTERLIFE!”

It’s a miracle how I reached the film industry.

It was over 20 days in Mumbai. I was working in a roadside tea-stall. One night, something untoward happened which made me decide to quit the place.

The next morning, quite early, I started and kept walking, much like a rudderless boat. From VT (Victoria Terminus) side, I still remember that tea-shop, which is still there. I thought, I will keep walking and will see to it when I feel hungry.

After walking for a few hours, I saw a hospital board that displayed the names of its doctors. One of those names was that of Dr Chittaranjan Patnaik. Seeing Patnaik, I thought definitely this guy has to be an Odia, and there is a far-fetched possibility that he might find some work for me – maybe a peon or something.

Didn’t have much of a choice, so I decided to crash-land.

I went near the gate. Remember, it’s immediately after the Mumbai blasts. Those were turbulent times, and people didn’t have much faith on each other. Even my condition was miserable, to say the least. Imagine, 15-20 days of staying on the footpath using the same clothes – I didn’t even have a chappal. Much like a drifter, a beggar.

The burly Marathi guards scanned me from top to bottom and asked me – what is my business in the hospital? I convinced them somehow telling them that the doctor is my brother, I was coming to him when someone stole my belongings and I lost the way – a real sob story I spun around my condition. I pleaded to them to make me meet him once, and everything will be sorted out.

The security head was convinced that I was lying. He told his junior, in Marathi, to take me up to the doctor, and if my claims turned out to be false, to beat me all the way down. He was glaring at me, but I tried holding my cool. Nothing to lose.

The junior guard took me to the fourth floor of the hospital which was the residential ward for the doctors. I was, obviously, panicking. There’s no way Dr Patnaik would accept me as his brother and even recognize me, and then these goons in the guise of guards will thrash me to shreds. But my desperation took the best of me, and I continued climbing the stairs, checking out opportunities to escape all the way up to the fourth floor. I could hear my heart thump erratically, conveying its disapproval to me in not so uncertain terms.

Anyways, I rang the bell of Dr Patnaik’s quarter. He was clad in dhoti, perhaps doing Puja, getting ready for his day’s work. As soon as I saw him, I started blabbering in chaste Odiya. After listening to me for a while, he turned and went inside – almost like suggesting, you wait, I will join you after getting ready. The junior guard with me might have also felt the same, because he had no idea what I told him in Odia. He went off. He must have thought we know each other.

The doctor left the door open, but I had no clue what to do. I thought he must be thinking I am one of those patients without funds asking for help or something on those lines. He didn’t even listen to the entire thing that I had to say. It might be that he was in a hurry and he will talk to me on his way to work – that’s what I thought. So, I sat on the stairs, waiting for him.

It was after quite some time that I had a clean place to sit, that too on the fourth floor of a building. I have been roaming around at the ground level for such a long time, that this height seemed like paradise. Here, nobody is harassing me. A feeling of relief engulfed me, I suppose, so I promptly went to sleep.

Suddenly, someone woke me up with a jolt, and it was a face that I recognized. I was in complete daze – and for some time I thought I must have died and this must be my afterlife.

The boy who woke me was also totally staggered to see me. It was the same friend from my hometown whom I wrote a letter before I ventured out for Bombay – where I told that come what may, I am not likely to return. I sent 25 paise postcards to four of my friends – he was one of them, and he was the younger brother of Dr Patnaik.

Now this guy decided to come to Bombay with my letter and my photo – with the intention to find me. He has been travelling around the rail station, to different eateries and police stations with my details. And I am sitting right here, right in front of his door.

Can’t even call it a coincidence, it’s so strange.

Then he took me in. Considering my condition, straight into the bathroom. He washed me much like people clean their buffaloes. By then I had almost surrendered myself out of fatigue – watching with a stolid glance the stream of black dirt that was coming out of my body and draining into the gutters. Was this really happening to me?

After that he fed me. A simple home-made hot meal of dal, chawal and bhaji, but it tasted like heaven. After such a long time I was having one complete meal. My eyes overflowed with tears, thankful of every morsel of food that was going into my mouth.

Now I knew I have survived the city. I have my friend here, I have a place to stay, now things are bound to happen. Positive things. If God has considered escorting me this far, he must have a design template ready for me. I just need to learn and live it.

A couple of days later, this school friend took Sukant to his and Dr Patnaik’s brother, Ajit Patnaik, an art director in the film industry. Ajit took Sukant in, even allowed him to stay at his house for a year. Sukant started learning the basics of art-direction under his tutelage.

Art direction happened to him by chance. At that point in time, Sukant was ready to do anything. He was just about seventeen years old and anything felt better than what he just went through. That apart, Sukant always had the creative bug towards building things, even while in school. That talent got a gush of wind under its wings.

“NO ‘SPECIAL’ STATUS! LET HIM LEARN HANDS-ON”

Under Ajit dada, I learnt the basics of set design.

All of this was so new to me. I remember, there was one Prakash Mehra serial. ‘Nukkad’ was also being shot – I saw the floor, the set, actors. I got used to the film-culture.

Ajit dada literally kickstarted me into the film industry.

I remember, right from the beginning he ensured a ‘learning by doing’ process for me. While he introduced me to his team as his brother’s friend, he also made sure that no-one assigns me any ‘special’ status. He told his team, make him do everything. Let him learn hands-on.

So that’s what I did. Assisting carpenters, painters, even helping in the disposal of garbage. Once the assigned task is over, I always looked for the next task. This approach was liked by all, that I was never sitting idle. They appreciated that I was at least trying. It’s not that they didn’t bully me, but they also encouraged me.

After a year or so, I shifted out of Ajit dada’s place. Got into kind of a community living, a small room packed with people. A couple of them might be from the film industry, but mostly they were daily-wage workers from Odisha. 6 people crammed in a room, sharing food and rent. In around 300 rupees – all expenses covered.

Ajit Patnaik mostly did TV serials.

Sukant was good with the paintbrush, he was eager to learn, but the work he was getting was irregular – say about 5-6 days in a month. Rest of the days were free. Sukant kept earning and learning by taking up odd household jobs of film-actors and producers, usually offered to newbies because they came cheap.

Those days, he used to walk to work a lot to save money. Six rupees saved in fare means one half-rice plate, that was the calculation. While walking, he kept his eyes open for sign-boards that needed repair work, and asked for the job. He also tried his hand at painting number plates in a garage at one-third the market rates. Slowly, he started getting assignments to paint the entire truck, making good money out of it. Encouraged, he bought a few more brushes, started practicing his drawing skills. All of this boosted his confidence.

Sukant felt, he was now ready to level up.

“I PITCHED MYSELF AS AN ARTIST”

I started asking seniors on the set how to become an art-director. They advised me to learn perspective drawing. Ajit dada told me to observe acutely and go through the scripts to understand the character – and think of the elements needed in the set accordingly.

Each home has a character. Say, there is a police officer’s quarters. If he is an honest officer, then what could he have at his home. If he is corrupt, how that would reflect in the set. Information and observation. I started prepping myself. Scanning anything I saw, anywhere.

I took measurements of things that we are likely to use in a set. Like a window – what are its dimensions, and what is the usual height of the window from the floor. What is the height of a dining table – and so on. From then onwards, it became an ingrained habit of sorts – scanning everything minutely, where ever I went.

I pitched myself as an artist and not a labour when I started looking for film-related work outside Ajit-dada’s team. If I didn’t get art-related work, I did truck unloading work or any work to survive – but identified myself as an artist.

That was when 18 years old Sukant started reaching out to Filmistan studios.

There’s a small temple there, which was created for a set, but had eventually turned into a marketplace for daily-wage workers. Every morning, around 7-8 AM, a variety of workers used to come there and wait. Anybody required any helping hand at the floor, they used to come and ask for it, and take their pick from the available skillsets there.

Sukant went there for two three days. He got to know from others that some SRK film is happening. A Yash Chopra film was also on the works.

He started dreaming big. This is where he wanted in.

“YOU TELL ME WHICH ONE IS THE ORIGINAL?”

There was this set there of a Shahrukh film – ‘English Babu, Desi Mem’.

It was the interiors of a ship, an action sequence. Kiran Kumar was the villain – his scene required him to get angry and throw a sofa. The actual sofa was quite heavy. They needed a sofa made of thermocol. So, the production controller came out and asked if there was a thermocol artist – and I was so desperate I volunteered.

That was the beginning, but from thereon I decided to never say no to any kind of work, because some way or the other, I knew, a solution was bound to present itself.

I had absolutely no idea of how to deal with thermocol. What are the tools needed to cut it with precision – I didn’t know anything. When I went inside, I started gauging the situation at hand. I felt, if somehow, I could match the fabric and its colour, I will somehow replicate the shape of the sofa. I took a piece of original fabric and went outside, and fortunately got the same cloth from a furnishing outlet.

The action sequence was to be shot the next morning. My task was to create this sofa overnight and keep it ready for shoot.

I have to admit, I felt a sword was hanging over my head. I suppose this fear worked for me. They closed the floor during the night, and left me outside with one sample sofa and my stuff. They told me that they would pay me around 2000 rupees if I could complete the task, so that was also an incentive. The fact that I might get to see so many 100-rupee notes at one go, that kept me working tirelessly through the night.

Praveen Nischol, the elder brother of Naveen Nischol (the actor), was the director of the film. He came early in the morning. Both the sofas were kept side by side, the original and the replica. As soon as he arrived, his first query was about the sofa, because the fight-master was waiting. Both looked the same. I also somehow got into the daredevil mode and challenged him – you tell me which one is the original?

He invariably went to sit on the fake sofa, and we stopped him.

He was really impressed. This was a last-minute rush job, and many others declined to do it. Some of them were charging a bomb, but I didn’t really jostle for money. I just took the task, and delivered. That worked in my favour.

This news spread in the studio, that there is an artist who has met a seemingly impossible deadline and done a good job of it.

This is where the story of Sukant actually begun. — *This is where the story of Sukant Panigrahy took an amazing twist.*

This luck-by-chance became the launch-pad for Sukant.

People started talking, and those talks reached Sharmistha Roy – the art director of DDLJ. She is the daughter of Sudhendu Roy – and the sequence for which Sukant made the sofa was his set.

Now Sudhendu Roy was the undoubted big-boss of set-design and art-direction. Best known for his realistic sets in Bimal Roy films like Sujata, Bandini, and Madhumati, he was also a regular with glitzy Yash Chopra and Subhash Ghai films. A winner of three Filmfare awards, Sudhendu Roy set yardsticks with his work in films like Karz, Karma and Kaala Patthar.

*Sudhendu Roy was one of the originals who came to Bombay with Bimal Roy. He kept aligning himself with time, becoming one of the most reliable art directors of the Hindi Film Industry*

Sudhendu Roy was quite old by then. He didn’t come to the sets. It was his daughter Sharmistha who carried forward her father’s mantle. DDLJ was Sharmistha’s magnum opus, as an independent Art Director. She met Sukant on the sets of DDLJ, and, impressed by his passion and skills – continued to give him work.

“IF SOMEBODY ELSE CAN DO IT, WHY CAN’T I?”

Sharmistha Roy became my mentor. I was still just a kid, she kind of treated me like her younger brother. Used to call me home when she had to explain some work to me. It was in her home where I saw a huge art-library for the first time. It had a very good collection – so I used to spend a lot of time there. I also got exposure with them.

Mostly I had no clue of how to do the tasks that Sharmistha assigned me, but I did them and delivered.

I always thought, if somebody else can do it, why can’t I?

That apart, Sudhendu Dada had preserved lots of his set-design drawings from his former works. I spent my free time diligently studying those water-colour drawings – say, for instance, the tunnel images from Kaala Patthar. Also, he had directed the Amitabh Bachchan, Nutan film ‘Saudagar’. I felt that God has finally brought me to the right place. So, an art director can also become a director – that’s awesome!

I heard the first two films of Sudhendu Dada, ‘UPHAAR’ and ‘SAUDAGAR’ ended up becoming India’s official selection for the Oscars. I also heard that whenever Amitabh Bachchan gets to know that Sudhendu dada was in the sets, he would always come meet him, touch his feet, and have a cup of tea before leaving – he respected him so much. For me it was fascinating – Amitabh Bachchan comes to touch his feet. That’s because when he was going down and out, he gave him that break in Saudagar.

So, for me, the decision was now etched in stone. For now, I will become an art director and then, maybe later, a film-maker. That was one major turning point – meeting Sudhendu dada and mentoring by Sharmistha Roy.

Starting with the DDLJ set, Sukant worked with Sharmistha Roy for around eight years.

After DDLJ she was flooded with all the top offers with top directors. Mahesh Bhatt, Subhash Ghai, Indra Kumar – all their films were with her. And she had such a large unit, that it was never a problem doing three films at a time.

*The journey from DDLJ to Mohabbatein with Sharmistha Roy gave Sukant exposure, confidence and credibility.*

Which also meant, Sukant was never free. She kind of trained him to take up one area – like anyone could erect the basic set, but what after that? What will be the colouring treatment after that – she used to discuss that with Sukant? Asked him to choose between colours. In the process Sukant learnt the names of so many different shades.

Back-to-back work with tough deadlines.

Sukant even had to be hospitalized once, for dehydration – since he insisted to complete his work and then go home.

“EVERY SET BECAME A 24X7 COMMITMENT”

Sharmistha had tremendous faith in my abilities. Always used to say – Sukant will do this, don’t worry.

I became her trusted aide. Sharmistha assigned me the task of painting the sets – almost like a separate section that could be called the department of final touch. Which means, after the set reaches a certain stage, I would get the final three-four days to complete it.

Every such set became a 24X7 commitment. I didn’t go out, took my bath in the studio bathroom to complete the work on time. If you remember, in Dil Toh Pagal Hai, the sets had a huge amount of artwork. Remember that competition song in the studio – it was a very artistic studio. There was so much of work to be done.

That set finally got ready on the morning of that shoot, and I was introduced to SRK – see this is Sukant. He has done all the artistic work. Shahrukh extended his hand to shake, but I was like – all these handshakes can wait, but for now, please can I go home? I am totally drained out. I have delivered the set – now please start shooting. That was the level of my fatigue.

I took a taxi, but couldn’t reach home. I felt so weak that I asked the taxi driver to stop near a clinic. I felt like I might faint, but somehow, I entered the clinic. The doctors there checked my vitals and immediately put me on a saline drip, prohibiting me from going out of the hospital for at least 24 hours.

Couldn’t help it… now can’t enjoy this fav track of mine without looking at the artwork.

During these 6-7 years while assisting Sharmistha Roy, Sukant also did a film appreciation course with filmmaker Ashok Rane, a multiple National Award winner for documentary films.

In that two-day workshop, he saw ‘Pather Panchali’ for the first time.

By his own admission, he had no idea that such films exist. The film blew his mind – this is also how a story can be told. People make films with such levels of passion, such craftsmanship – all of this was new to him.

The urge to become a film-maker started taking centre stage all over again.

“I QUIT THE FIELD OF ART-DIRECTION”

That film-appreciation course changed my outlook.

I thought, life has given me a start, and I should use it. Even Alfred Hitchcock was an art-director before he started making his own films. So why not me?

Although I was working with Sharmistha, I didn’t want to become an Art-Director anymore. Rather, I started observing how directors operate in their sets. How they managed the crew, how they got work out of technicians and actors – all of that.

On the other hand, my work was being noticed. After seven eight years of working with Sharmistha, people started asking for me. I mean, say she was not on the sets, people asked if I was available to resolve their issues. It also sometimes happened that they explained things to me directly and told me to convey it to my boss.

I believe she didn’t like what was happening.

Maybe a kind of insecurity started gnawing into our relationship. I felt that – so I told her point blank, till the time you are working as an Art-Director here, I will never take up independent Art-Direction.

I remember, the last film in which I worked with her was ‘Mohabbatein’. The work for ‘Kabhi Khushi Kabhi Gam’ was just about to start. While she started talking about the film, I told her I won’t be working in the film, since I wanted to learn animation and VFX. I will do your work if needed but as of now, I quit the field of Art Direction.

She probably understood that something she might have said could have hurt me, but what to do? What has to happen, happens.

Sukant wanted to move out, but Art Direction was in no mood to leave him alone – work kept coming. He thought of leaving Mumbai to avoid this.

By that time, he had made an animation storyboard. To make the film, he started talks with animators. They told him – to master the craft, he needed to get inside the domain and learn hands-on. Sukant went to Chennai and joined as an apprentice in an Animation studio.

While in Chennai doing the course, he was constantly in touch with Sharmistha Roy. One of those days, Sharmistha informed him that Subhash Ghai was asking for him. Sukant had worked for him in Taal.

Back in Mumbai, Sukant met Subhash Ghai and expressed his desire do something good in the area of animation. To do that, he and his team needs to go to Los Angeles to learn the craft better. The deal could be, after returning, they can work exclusively for Mukta Arts.

Subhash Ghai agreed to sponsor Sukant and his team.

“STAYING SAFE WAS NEVER MY STYLE.”

I was on top of the world.

I have well-wishers like Sharmistha Roy, icons like Subhash Ghai to sponsor me, I will go and learn VFX and Animation – I thought of myself to be nothing less than Spielberg.

Subhash-ji told me to build a team and set up infrastructure of the Animation and VFX department of the school he was starting then – Whistling Woods. He gave me a paper and pen, and told me to make a list of the equipment I might need to set up the department.

I remember asking my friends and making a list of top-end hardware and software worth 21 lakhs – but he signed off the entire amount without raising a question. What else can one expect?

I joined the school, set up the department, and by the time ‘Bhumi-Pujan’ happened at the institute, I was part of the main crew of Subhash-ji. I kept waiting and it took me close to a year to realize that my going to Los Angeles to learn advanced animation is probably not going to happen. Subhashji’s priority, at that moment, was to set up the school.

A job at ‘Whistling Woods’ was a safe place with a handsome salary, but staying safe was never my forte, so I started looking for other opportunities.

That was also the point of time when I learnt that Sharmistha Roy was planning to get married and settle abroad, so she will not be working as an art director in India anymore. I had this mental block that till the time my boss was in the Mumbai Film Industry; I will not work as an art director here. That obstacle was no more there.

That is when Gangajal happened.

Desperate to escape from the job security of Whistling Woods, Sukant went and met Prakash Jha. At that point in time, Prakash Jha had a series of flops, so he wanted to tread his path rather cautiously. Gangajal was not supposed to be a big film. It had limited budget.

Prakash Jha has seen Sukant work as Sharmistha’s assistant in his previous films like ‘Dill Kya Karein’ and ‘Mrityudand’. He knew what Sukant was capable of. Other Art Directors he approached were either not interested, or apprehensive of the budget.

Sukant, on the other hand, was desperate for a chance.

“WHATEVER YOU MAKE, THAT WILL BE BIHAR.”

Prakashji asked me, what would I charge.

I said getting a break with him was more important to me, so whatever he might give, I will be happy with it. He took me in.

I started building my team. I was given a script. Even before I realized, pressure started building up. The expectations from Gangajal were huge – in terms of art direction.

You have to understand, I was a novice in certain matters.

In Sharmistha’s set I used to do the finishing, but here I have to build an entire village from Bihar right here in Maharashtra, with all its components starting from scratch. Where will the wood come from, other materials – it was a challenge, but I took it.

When the initial meetings were happening, I requested Prakash ji to allow me to go to Bihar for a few days, to get a sense of rural Bihar. I needed to understand the colour palette of the domain. There was no internet those days – I had no reference. He told me point blank, who has seen Bihar? Whatever you make, that will be Bihar for the people who see it, so just go make it. Just take care there are no Marathi wall writings and posters – rest we will manage.

Now despite being a good mentor, Prakash Jha is quite short tempered. He used to get aggressive, even slap people when angry. That is something that I could never digest. I used to think, if this happens with me, I will give it back to him. But I was also determined, I will see the project till the end, come what may.

It was so much like a military operation.

For the entire pre-production phase, I chose to stay with the workers in their tent. We worked overnight and although the hotel was just about 25 minutes away – I didn’t feel like wasting time. Workers used to stay in an abandoned (allegedly haunted) hospital, where I cleaned a room for myself and stayed there while the set was being erected.

For all those 45-50 days, I didn’t budge from the set.

I had a small team. Around 13 people. I was scared, this was my first film, so I gave a limited budget. I did involve some locals. So, getting the work done within a tough timeline with a small team and a batch of inexperienced locals – you could very well imagine how hard it was. But my staying with them helped. They got emotionally involved and took the challenge personally.

The situation was back-breaking. The treatment was harsh. I often cried when alone in the night, wondering if I took the right step. Is this what I want to do? Couldn’t leave it midway – else no one will give me work again. So somehow, keeping my senses together, we met the deadline.

It was during the making of Gangajal that I started ruminating about the harsh treatment meted by the producers to menial workers. It’s your work we are doing – so what’s the use of being rude? Can’t the same thing be done in a cordial manner?

These thoughts continued to occur to me.

Those thoughts remained with Sukant Panigrahy.

Much later, while at the top of his game, he took significant efforts to make working conditions better for menial labours who painstakingly erect those magnificent structures that form the backdrop of our cinema.

He knew he was going to make enemies, but yet, at his peak of career, Sukant spent 7 years in strengthening a labour union as its President – the Art and Costume Union. And yes, he did ruffle a few feathers and lost a few projects, branded as the union guy.

Even while working with Sharmistha, he ran a self-sponsored NGO to teach slum kids, helping them nurture their talents. When the excesses of the industry aggrieved him, he used the waste to build accommodation for the poor.

Sukant has also created numerous studio and outdoor installation-art pieces, using e-waste, to generate awareness among people about the threat e-waste poses on our environment.

With Sukant, when a thought arrives, it leads to action. Some of these actions might seem like banging your head against a concrete wall, but that’s how it is. That’s who he is.

But yes, he also created backdrops for films that are now considered to be cult-classics. Ranging from the harsh realism of ‘Drishyam’ to the surrealism of ‘Dev D’, from the funky world of ‘Tashan’ to the tense thrills of ‘Ek Tha Tiger’ to reliving the past with ‘Manikarnika’ – he has been everywhere, at ease.

More of that later, in our second and final part.

As soon as possible.