Sadgati (The Deliverance)

This print captures Smita Patil as Jhuria in a scene from Satyajit Ray’s film, Sadgati, which released in 1981. The film is a vicious indictment of the caste system in India, which sadly continues to be prevalent even today. It was based on a short story of the same name by Hindi stalwart Munshi Premchand. Ray called it ‘a deeply angry film [...] not the anger of an exploding bomb but of a bow stretched taut and quivering.’ Patil, one of the most talented actresses of Indian cinema, stage and television, had a prolific, yet short-lived career due to her tragic, untimely death in 1986.