Died: Jehangir Shapurji Bhownagary, 83, erstwhile joint secretary to India’s ministry of information and broadcasting, and chief advisor (films) to the then Prime Minister of India Indira Gandhi, on April 11, 2004 in Paris.
"Rarely have I known someone so richly endowed. His catholicity of interests, his varied talents, his subtle sense of humor and his exuberantly cosmopolitan character placed him several notches above his peers,” wrote Dileep Padgaonkar in his column in the Sunday Times of India of May 2, 2004, having enjoyed Bhownagary’s hospitality on umpteen occasions in Paris when they would invariably discuss UNESCO which Bhownagary had served for nearly three decades.
Shortly after India won its Inde-pendence, Bhow-nagary joined the UNESCO as program assistant in the mass communications department. Three decades later when he retired he was deputy director of UNESCO’s public information and audiovisual division. The intervening years were spent in strengthening UNESCO’s radio and visual information division and press and audiovisual division, as executive assistant at the director general’s office and as program specialist in its mass communications department. For a while he was producer/director of UN’s Asian Film Project (in India, Malaysia, Ceylon).
Bhownagary: creative conjuror
When summoned by the Indian government he took charge of the Films Division (FD) in 1954 which was then in a nascent state. As documentary maker N. S. Thapa mentioned to the Screen Weekly of May 21, 2004, "The coming of Bhownagary was like a shot in the arm. He inspired us into creative thinking...Many talents surfaced.” Documentary film director Prem Vaidya penned his vivid recollections in the Screen: "Incidentally the year of my joining FD had a happy coincidence with Bhownagary from UNESCO taking charge as a deputy chief producer of the Films Division. It was a very crucial year for the FD...This was also the time for Bhownagary to spread cheer through friendly approach towards the staff in the bureaucratic set-up where work-to-rule was the prime factor. Soon he succeeded in generating ‘work is worship’ feelings in FD. He encouraged each and every director, cameraman, editor and animator to find and create an individual style in this creative media...He gave them the sense of belonging to an organization, the biggest in Asia and the second biggest in the world — next only to the National Film Board of Canada.” In the absence of television in the country, the FD produced two documentaries and a newsreel in nine languages every week. During the three years he spent here, he helped found a cartoon film unit at the FD as well as the Film and Television Institute of India in Poona.
On loan from UNESCO he was again recalled to India in 1965 when Indira Gandhi wanted him to be her chief advisor (films) and joint secretary to India’s ministry of information and broadcasting which was now producing a newsreel and at least two documentaries in 17 official languages. He was assigned the task of supervizing seven film related organizations and chairing various inter-ministerial committees. He also had the opportunity to co-chair the International Film Festival of India with Satyajit Ray.
Referring to his "knack to pick up the jewel from the mob,” Vaidya related how the avant garde Bhownagary "sure of the vigorous springs of M. F. Husain’s creativity” approached him to make a film under the Experimental Film Programme. The film, Through The Eyes Of A Painter was entered in the XVII International Film Festival in Berlin in 1967 and won the top prize of Golden Bear for the best short film. "Good work can be done best if one thoroughly enjoys doing it,” was Bhownagary’s response to the accolades that came his way.
Several other films of Bhownagary also won international awards. He went on to win two more Golden Bears in Berlin and in San Francisco he won the Golden Gate Award. In 1968 he was conferred the Padma Shri by the Government of India.
Throughout his life "the craftsman/artist in him was perpetually involved in discovering and working with new material,” notes a life sketch. He was a potter, sculptor, engraver and painter and exhibited in various countries. His childhood fascination for conjuring remained a life long passion.
Born in Bombay to a Zoroastrian father and French mother, Bhownagary had studied at the Cathedral and John Connon School and St Xavier’s College before proceeding to Paris to study at Lycee Michelet, Ecole des Hautes Etudes Sociales, Ecole des Hautes Etudes Internationales. During World War II he worked night shifts at Reuters, for a while was with Tata Sons and later joined All India Radio. In 1945 he became script and commentary writer at the Information Films of India and Cartoon Film Unit producing the first animation films commissioned by the Government on health and rural reform. The next year he was appointed assistant producer and news editor of the Indian News Parade.
To entertain servicemen, hospital wards and prisoners of war he donned the robes of magician Fu Ling Yoo in the Toe-H Concert Party. A keen dramatist, actor, producer he was known best in Bombay as a comedian in plays and satirical reviews in English and Gujarati which he co-wrote with Adi Marazban. Proud to be a Parsi, he told the Outlook (February 4, 2002), "Despite having spent so much time outside India and away from my culture, I feel very much a Parsi. I have followed the traditions and tried to bring up our children according to the Parsi tradition.”
A keen gourmet he shared his love for good food and wine with his guests who constituted poets, painters, actors, academics, writers and filmmakers. "Their banter in English and French about life and letters continued late into the night...debunking ever so lightly the vanities of the rich, the famous and the powerful. And then as the party moved into top gear he would perform magic tricks which left the guests speechless with wonder.” As sums up cookery expert Jeroo Mehta, "Humble but scintillating, quiet yet uproarious, caring and humorous, simple but so generous, he was a wonderful human being.”
The creative Bhownagary is survived by his wife Freny, and daughters Janine Bharucha and Asha Phillips.
P. M. G.