A COUNTRY CALLED CHILDHOOD: A Memoir by Deepti Naval

Author:Deepti Naval [Naval, Deepti]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Aleph Book Company
Published: 2022-07-02T00:00:00+00:00

Once, some cine stars from Bombay came to our city for a cricket match. Among them were Shyama, Nirupa Roy, and Bhagwan Dada. They performed a show at the Chitra Talkies. That’s the time my mother also performed along with them. When she made her entry on stage, Didi, sitting next to me in the hall started to shout, ‘Mama! … That’s my Mama!’ All heads turned to look at us. It was a moment that embarrassed my mother but she’d recall it always with a lot of love.

I assume that my mother did some more plays during my baby years, but by the time I was old enough to properly appreciate her talents as an actress she had stopped. Years later, she told me that Bibiji had once said to her, ‘The women at the Women’s Conference say that your daughter-in-law does dramas!’

‘After that day,’ said Mama, ‘I stopped. I never did another play. Never uttered a word to my mother-in-law. I just silently gave up everything.’ I was not aware of the impact of that finale in my mother’s life, for she never showed any bitterness. But I know what that sacrifice must have meant to her. This was the woman who dreamt of becoming an actress and called herself the Beauty Queen of Bengal. Today, as I live my life as an artiste, I realize the gravity of those words. ‘I silently gave up everything …’

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