Why Sabyasachi ‘Feluda’ Chakrabarty has a paunch

Veteran Bengali actor Sabyasachi Chakrabarty who is widely known for playing the private investigator Feluda says it is time that he plays elderly, father-like roles, now that he has a paunch. Sharing the story behind the paunch, he adds that he has no plan to exercise extensively to reduce the extra kilos.

“I think it is my time to play a father’s role than Feluda on-screen—come on, I am not young anymore! In fact, when I was playing Feluda, I had the paunch and I was hiding it as much as possible. I have got this paunch for some reason. I met with an accident a few years ago and due to that, I was bedridden for more than two months,” Sabyasachi told IANS.

I had to ingest a lot of fatty food and many antibiotics were pumped in. So, that resulted in the paunch. My wife keep saying ‘do yoga, do exercise’ to reduce the belly now. But I am happy with these extra kilos. And look, Feluda is all about ‘magajastra’ (weapon of the mind). It is the mind that is at work!” he added.

The character Feluda is a creation of Oscar-winning Bengali filmmaker Satyajit Ray. Sabyasachi played Feluda from 2003 to 2016, notably “Bombaiyer Bombete”, “Kailashey Kelenkari”, “Gorosthaney Sabdhan”, and “Royal Bengal Rahashya”.

Sabyasachi is currently seen in the web show “Lalbazaar”, where he plays a senior police officer. The show is shot in Hindi and Bengali and, according to the actor, “there were few scenes in which I had to speak in Hindi and Bengali simultaneously. That was a little tough. Being a Delhiite I speak in Hindi but this show is set in Kolkata. So, to keep the authenticity intact of the place Lalbazaar, we tried to speak in Hindi the way Kolkatans do! It was interesting”.

Directed by Sayantan Ghosal, “Lalbazaar” also features Kaushik Sen, Dibyendu Bhattacharya, Hrishitaa Bhatt, and Subrat Dutta, and is streaming on ZEE5.