A CORRESPONDENT
DOOMDOOMA: The news that the Assamese film Chameli Memsab (1975), based on a short story penned by Nirod Chaudhury on the real life story of a tea garden near here, would be remade under the banner of AN Films, brought happy tidings for the people of this industrial township - popularly known as tea city of Doomdooma. But soon the cultural circle of this town was disappointed as the list of invitees for the press meet held Guwahati for making the announcement did not include anyone from the story writer's family.
When contacted, Dr Indira Chaudhury, wife of Nirod Chaudhury, said that she came to know about it when George Baker - the actor who played the lead role of Barkle Sahab in the film - called her from Kolkata to express his joy on hearing the news of its remake. He expressed his utter astonishment at the treatment meted out to the family of the story writer of the film. In fact, it was Nirod Chaudhury who spotted George Baker for the lead role.
Till now, Chameli Memsab is the only Assamese story to have its film versions in three different languages i.e. Assamese, Bengali and Hindi. Secondly, it earned the distinction of being the first Assamese film to be screened in the Rashtrapati Bhavan in New Delhi. It is in this context that people here expect the remake version not to deviate from the content and backdrop as described in the original story.
The Assamese version of the film was directed by Abdul Mazid and had in its lead roles George Baker and Binita Gohain. The musical score of the film was given by Dr Bhupen Hazarika and he won the Best Music Director's award from the President - also a first for an Assamese film to have earned that distinction till then. The Bengali version of Chameli Memsab (1979) had Indar Sen as its director with George Baker and Rakhi Gulzar portraying the main roles while Chameli Memsab in Hindi, directed by Ajay Lahiri, was released in 1981 with Tom Alter, Mithun Chakraborty and Abha Dhulia in the main cast. Like its Assamese version, Dr Bhupen Hazarika scored the music for the other two versions of the film in Bengali and Hindi as well.
Dr Indira Chaudhury also revealed that after telecast of a few episodes of the tele-serial of Chameli Memsab made few years back with due permission from her, the production of the rest of the episodes was stopped by the producer due to some unknown reasons.
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