Rarest of rare memorabilia includes a letter from the sitar maestro’s son Shubho to his mother Annapurna Devi, in which he complains about being neglected on his birthday by Ravi Shankar; Author SMM Ausaja was searching for vintage movie posters when he stumbled upon a suitcase stuffed with memorabilia; contents suggest they belonged to Ravi Shankar and his musician wife Annapurna’s son Shubho who died in 1992
Khalid Mohamed (MUMBAI MIRROR; September 23, 2019)

Musical notations composed by sitar maestro Pandit Ravi Shankar, as well as letters written by him, photographs, press cuttings dating back to the 1960s, autographed brochures, and more have been recovered from a battered old leather suitcase which was dumped at a scrap dealer close to Mahim Railway Station. The suitcase made available for perusal to Mumbai Mirror, besides yielding a treasure trove of memorabilia, contains voluminous files of notes and notations by Bharat Ratna Ravi Shankar for some of his famed operas and ragas which were performed at shows the world over. That the material is authentic can be verified from the signature of Ravi Shankar on most of the rescued material.

A draft of a letter of complaint by the musician to the British organisers of a concert tour reveals that at the outset of his career, he would neither be paid nor given “a pat on the back” for his shows which had played to packed houses. In addition, notations for film scores have been discovered, albeit in a mottled condition which like the rest of the finds need to be restored digitally at the earliest.

There are photographs showing Ravi Shankar as a budding musician in his late teens, and snapshots of his first wife, the revered classical singer Annapurna Devi (born Roshanara Khan), daughter of Ustad Allauddin Khan, who laid the foundation for the modern Maihar Gharana.

Add to these, albums of sketches by their son, musician and graphic artist Shubhendra ‘Shubho’ Shankar, which have all been rescued in the nick of time before they were shredded, junked, or sold by their weight in kilos to re-cyclists of waste paper.

The suitcase was located by chance by SMM Ausaja, author of the book Bollywood in Posters. While scouring around for vintage movie posters, booklets and stills, the film scholar randomly picked out the suitcase and was startled by its content, retrieving it immediately. On being asked what he intends to do with it, he stated, “I’m a collector. I intend to preserve it for posterity.”

From all indications the suitcase belonged to the maestro’s son ‘Shubho’ aka Shubhendra Shankar, who passed away in California, at the age of 50, in 1992 after a bout of pneumonia. Towards the end years, he had withdrawn from the music scene and eked out a living for his wife and two children by working at a liquor store and drawing illustrations for telephone directories.

Ravi Shankar lived till the age of 92, succumbing to respiratory insufficiency in California in 2012. The mother of Shubho, the reclusive Annapurna Devi who resided in a Breach Candy highrise, passed away last year at the age of 91.

That the suitcase belonged to Shubho appears to be a given, since it contains his albums of drawings, including a striking pencil portrait of his father. Moreover, a greeting card designed as a gift to his father and signed by Ravi Shankar, could have been stored by the son as a remembrance. In a letter to Annapura Devi, he complains about being neglected on his birthday by his father.

Quite emotionally, the visiting card of the maestro mentioning his address in Pavlova building on Little Gibbs Road in Mumbai, and the apartment’s plastic door-sign have been preserved.

Ravi Shankar and Annapurna Devi had separated in 1962 after 11 years of marriage. Both had remarried. The maestro became an internationally-lauded artiste of mythical proportions, collaborating with greats such as Yehudi Menuhin and George Harrison of the Beatles. However, Annapurna Devi chose never to perform again, it is believed, because she had felt slighted when Ravi Shankar couldn’t quite accept a section of classical music aficionados that she was a superior artiste.

Quite oddly, a short poem written on a Viennese hotel’s letterhead and signed by the master filmmaker Ritwik Ghatak was also in the suitcase. Written in Bengali, the poem’s opening lines, translated into English read, “Where and when were my days of yore lost/ How they were lost, my heart doesn’t know…”

A close-up portrait of Ustad Allauddin Khan – whom Ravi Shankar acknowledged as his guru --is mouldering amidst the material, demanding professional restoration.

The Ravi Shankar Foundation, based in California, has sought to continue the legacy of the superstar sitarist’s music forward both in India and abroad. Meanwhile, the retrieved suitcase is a pointer towards a heart-touching story – of how a son clung on to a bagful of mementoes of his father -- a bag which eventually landed up with a scrap dealer.