Mahananda's music captures the eternal essence of all revolutions, says director Arindam Sil

The music launch of Arindam Sil’s upcoming film Mahananda, inspired by the life and works of social activist-author Mahasweta Devi was held at the Bengal Club in Kolkata on 14 March. Tabla exponent-turned-music director Bickram Ghosh has composed the music of the film, which stars Gargee Roy Chowdhury and features Ishaa Saha, Debshankar Halder and Arna Mukhopadhyay.

Singers Iman Chakraborty, Sahana Bajpaie, Dipannita Acharya and Timir Biswas, who were also present at the event, performed the songs from the film.

According to the director, the film has been made with the intention to make common people understand the importance of the award-winning author’s entire body of work. “It’s been a challenging task to capture her entire legacy in a single film,” said Sil. “When it came to the music, I wanted to establish the fact that the core essence of all the revolutions is eternal. I told Bickram to come up with a soundscape that would reflect the time period between the 17^th century and the year 2011. I must say, he has done a commendable job.”

The music director elaborated, “We have created a tribal soundscape for Mahananda, which has been quite challenging for me. But I have used all original compositions, which are faithful to the sound of the Munda tribe, with whom Mahasweta Devi spent a lot of time.” Ghosh has extensively used the instruments of the indigenous community to create the sound of the film, throughout. According to him, he has only used Sarod for the sequences set in Kolkata.

The songs 'Hey Ote' and 'Dhol Baaje' feature vocals by Dipannita Acharya while Bajpaie has sung 'Rong Dhorse' and 'Ammar E Poth'. National award-winning vocalist Iman Chakraborty has lent her voice for the song 'Mati' while Timir Biswas has sung 'Dhanuk Uthao'. The 'Jhansi Song' is a duet by Biswas and Acharya. Subhendu Das Munshi has penned all the songs, except 'Apni Bnachle', which has been written, composed and rendered by Biswas.

“Mahananda is a tale based on the life of social activist Mahasweta Devi. The movie is sensitive, and it will be a visual experience which will touch our hearts,” said Firdausul Hasan, who has produced the film along with Probal Haldar of Friends Communication. “The music is soulful and flows with the story and has been sung with the utmost care by all the great singers. The music is available across all the leading digital music platforms,” he added.

Mahananda will be released in theatres on 8 April.