Kalyug Briefs

Samantaral – Bengali Film Review

Lessons learnt @Samantaral – meaning ‘parallel’

Everyone deserves love – whoever he is, however he is. Never hurt a human heart because God resides in everyone’s heart!

Story is about how a family deals with their transgender child (sibling). A middle class Bengali family, father is a teacher and mother is a simple housewife. A baby is born to them who happens to be a transgender. Also known as eunuchs or hijaras (Hindi), in India, many parents give away their eunuch children away to Hijara group – in fact children are snatched away forcibly from their parents. But lately parents can keep their children with them.

So when the child was born, the mother was too attached to her child and did not want to let him go anywhere. Her husband agreed to keep their child and tried their best to behave normal by providing him with normal upbringing regimen. The child’s name is Sujan. When he was in class 5, couple of his classmates see him in the toilet and make fun of him. A 4th class employee (peon or maybe a guard) of the school then takes him to a room and sexually assaults him!! Meaning? Meaning such is the mental block and conditionings of humans that they take it for granted that a transgender is only to be used for sex!



His parents get alarmed as he does not return from school on time and they start searching for him – only to find that he was molested (sodomized maybe) and his body was burning with high fever! Shaken by this incident and realizing that it would not be safe for their child to be left alone in this wicked world, they stop him from going out altogether and keep him closed in his room! The poor child then lives all alone in his room reading books and trying to self-counsel him that everything will be fine one day!

A very sad story of Sujan, that should make us all realize that no one should be mistreated just because of his genetic or any other disorder! It takes all sorts to make this world and we should know how to love and respect a person for his personality and not hate or keep him aloof because of  his shortcomings!



Various aspects of his life is shown – his relationship with father, sister, sister-in-law, brother, nephew ….the way each of them behaved with him (Sujan) showed their own natures and characters!

The youth of this current era are much more sensitive to the needs of all! They are open minded and want to help people in need. They should be given a fair chance to prove their worth.

There are ladies who are affectionate and loving! They make the ideal mother figures. And it is only because of such homely & kind natured ladies that the world is somehow continuing to exist. Such are the women who should be promoted, recognised, respected and even worshipped – who keep the family together tied in the bond of love.

There are family members who will turn out to be selfish and opportunists also! Such are the people who can sell their own wives just to get some business deal through! Such people seldom change  – one should understand that if a person can be wicked to his own family member…how good can he be to an outsider who he has married! His wife suffers the brunt of his wretchedness!

Wife of the opportunist – who was asked by her husband to entertain an aged sleazy creep so that he signs a business deal! When she denies, he husband reminds her of her flirtatious nature and the fact that when she could sleep with ‘other’ men before wedlock, what was stopping her now! Meaning? Once unchaste, always thought of being unchaste! Humans – both men & women – must remember that when ‘Character is gone, everything I gone’

The elderly or senior citizens must realize that the world has changed at a very rapid rate – they should come out of their clichéd ways and methods of handling situations….you cannot beat a human and turn him/her into a person of your liking! Learn to embrace people along with their  shortcomings – an aggressive behaviour may save your false EGO but ruin an entire life!

Exit mobile version