Narayan Sanyal

Indian writer (1923–2005)
the writer

Narayan Sanyal (26 April 1923 – 7 February 2005) was an Indian writer of modern Bengali literature as well as a civil engineer.

Narayan Sanyal was born in Krishnagar to Chittasukh Sanyal and Basantalata Devi. His name was initially Narayandas Sanyal in school life. His family consisted of wife Sabita Sanyal; elder daughter Anindita Basu, son in law Amitabha Basu, son Tirtharenu Sanyal, daughter in law Sharmila Sanyal, younger daughter Mou Sanyal Talukdar, son in law Soumitra Talukdar. His granddaughter is Ayoshi Talukdar. Although Sanyal is known mostly as a novelist, he was also an eminent civil engineer by profession. After graduating in science from the University of Calcutta, he passed Bachelor of Engineering from Bengal Engineering College in 1948. Thereafter he joined Public Works Department and later National Buildings Organisation, Ministry of Works and Housing, Eastern Region, Govt of India. He was a Fellow of the Institution of Engineers (India) and a Fellow of the Association of Engineers (India). He also wrote books in Civil Engineering such as Vaastu Vigyan. A biography of Narayan Sanyal was written by Pradip Dutta – Ami Narayan Sanyal Ke Dekhechi. A Documentary on Writer Narayan Sanyal was screened on the 18th Kolkata International Film Festival on 15 November 2012 at Bangla Academy The film " CHOKHER DEKHA PRANER KOTHA Narayan Sanyal " in Bengali named by his elder son in law Amitabha basu, was directed by his younger son in law Soumitra Talukdar and produced by his younger daughter Mou Sanyal.

Sanyal wrote numerous books that dealt with various topics, such as children, science, art and architecture, travels, psychiatry, technology, refugee problems, history, biographical pieces, encyclopaedia of animals, social novel and Devadasi related. This author also preferred writing books on deep shadow of many world famous works. One of the most popular sci fiction books, Nakshatraloker Debatatma [নক্ষত্রলোকের দেবতাত্মা], is based on the transformation of human race from primitive creature to civilised intelligent species controlling the whole earth. Then it deals with Jupiter exploration and a super intelligent computer HAL. The three part book is an inspiration of 2001: A Space Odyssey by Arthur C. Clarke. In his book, Sanyal named HAL as Jantra Na, in his mother tongue Bengali, it ambiguously means 'not a machine' as well as 'pain'. His most popular work is Biswasghatak [বিশ্বাসঘাতক] written about the Manhattan project that developed the first US atom bomb. This book is based on the shadow of Brighter than a Thousand Suns: A Personal History of the Atomic Scientists (1970), by Austrian Robert Jungk. Another book Timi Timingil is on whales. This stands on an article published in Reader's Digest. He also wrote a series of detective fiction called the Kanta [কাঁটা] (Thorn) series. Most of the stories were inspired from various foreign novels of Erle Stanley Gardner and Agatha Christie. The protagonist of Kanta series thriller, Barrister P. K. Basu was based on the character Perry Mason. Apart from this series, he wrote Bishupal Bodh: Uposonghar [বিশুপাল বধ: উপসংহার], which is basically a completion of Sharadindu Bandyopadhyay's unfinished Byomkesh Bakshi story: Bishupal Bodh. Narayan Babu fulfilled some terms given by Bandyopadhyay's friend Pratul Chandra Gupta, who edited Bandyopadhyay's works. Samaresh Basu, as the editor (also a friend of Sanyal) of Mahanagar, a magazine, published it in a Puja issue. Sanyal did not simply copy foreign works; he took the central themes and adapted them for a proper Bengali atmosphere, which would be familiar to Bengali readers. For this reason, some changes in the original plot and a few anachronisms (that suit, e. g. offering a chair to the accused & the witness at the courtroom in India— which is not generally the practice) necessarily occur in his writings. He always mentioned the source, the changes he made in his script, and why these were necessary. He also tried to keep the nomenclature resembling the original so as to offer his gratitude. He often referred to P. K. Basu as "the Perry Mason of the East", as it was Erle Stanley Gardner's masterpiece that inspired him to create Basu. It is undoubtedly accepted by all that Narayan Babu was one of the finest authors in Bengali and he was a class apart from the flock of contemporary Bengali writers those who were too dependent on sentiment and emotional overdose in their writings and too dependent on monopolist Bengali media/publication groups in commercial front.

He received several awards for literature including Rabindra Puraskar (for Aporupa Ajanta in 1969), Bankim Puraskar (for Rupmanjari in 2000), and Narasingha Dutta Award. Many of his books were filmed and he won the Best Film Story Writer Award (for Satyakaam) by Bengal Film Journalists.

Satyakam, his novel, was adapted into Hindi film, Satyakam (1969), directed by Hrishikesh Mukherjee, starring Dharmendra, Sharmila Tagore as Ranjana, Rabi Ghosh and Ashok Kumar. His another novel, Nagchampa was turned into Jadi Jantem, a Bengali Film released on 1 March 1974. This film was directed by Yatrik and starred by Uttam Kumar as P. K. Basu, Ruma Guha Thakurta as Ranu, Soumitra Chatterjee as Koushik Mitra, Supriya Choudhury as Sujata, Basanta Choudhury, Kamal Mitra and Haradhan Banerjee. Sanyal also wrote the dialogue. The plot of Ashleelotar Daye was adopted to a Chiranjit starred film with the same name (1983). Neelimay Neel was turned into a Tapas Paul, Indrani Haldar & Anup Kumar starred film in 1991. Pashanda Pandit was filmed by director Shibaprasad Sen. Soumitra Chatterjee starred film in 1993. Gajamukta was released in 1994 by director Ajit Lahiri.

Swargiyo Naraker Dwar Ebong [স্বর্গীয় নরকের দ্বার এবং ] (1992)
Leonardor Noteboi Ebong [লেঅনার্দোর নোটবই এবং ] (1992)