Should you walk down Elgin Road — the stretch that stutters with cafes, restaurants, boutiques and fairy lights before coming to a halt at a fancy-schmancy skyscraper — you are bound to notice the house on the pavement opposite. The same that bears a plaque at its entrance, a plaque that reads “Sir P.C. Mitter”.
It is more than a strong possibility that Satyajit Ray’s bhadralok sleuth Feluda aka Pradosh Chandra Mitter was inspired, in name, by Sir Provash Chunder Mitter of Elgin Road.
Arijit Mittra, one of his great grandsons, says, “It is possible that Ray walked past our house during one of his morning walks and that is when he noticed the plaque.” His brother Ananjan Mitter adds, “We do not really know if Ray walked down these streets or simply drove past.”
Son of high court judge Sir Romesh Chundra Mitter, Sir P.C. was a student of English at Presidency. Later, he studied law and started practising at Calcutta High Court.
In 1907, Sir Provash purchased what was then a single-storey house on Elgin Road and moved here from Paddapukur. The house next door belonged to Sir Nripendra Nath Sircar, who was advocate-general of Bengal. Ananjan says, “Sarat Bose was a tenant there.” In the same row stands Netaji Bhawan, which is now a museum dedicated to the memory of Subhas Chandra Bose. Sometime in the early 1900s, Janakinath Bose moved here from Cuttack. His wife Prabhabati was Sir P.C.’s first cousin. Ananjan continues, “The families shared a barber called Harrison.” Ananjan and Arijit roll with laughter. Turns out, Harrison was no Englishman. The unverifiable story goes that he was the son of a neighbourhood barber called Hari. Hari’s son, hence Harrison.
In 1928, Sir P.C. was appointed to the Governor’s executive council. He was also a part of the Round Table Conference of 1931, along with Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi, Sarojini Naidu, B.R. Ambedkar and others. In 1934, he was asked to officiate as Governor of Bengal. Arijit says, “But the day he was going to assume charge, he passed away.”
Ray and Sir P.C. never met. And by the time the filmmaker met Sir P.C.’s grandson Malay, the first Feluda story Feludar Goendagiri was already out in Sandesh, the Bengali magazine for children.
Ananjan, who is Malay’s son, says, “That day, Ray told Baba two things. One, the inspiration for Feluda’s name came from our nameplate. I mean, it’s not every day that you come across a Mitra spelt Mitter, right? Ray also expressed the wish to shoot one of his films inside our house, in front of our staircase landing, to be exact. But that didn’t happen.”
Once you cross the house of the Mitters and head straight towards Rabindra Sadan Metro station, you come upon a series of billboards in red, blue and green. They bear the name of a jeweller, who sounds much like Pradosh Mitter’s bete noire Maganlal Meghraj. It would seem that here in Calcutta, there are traces of Feluda everywhere for those with eyes to see them.
