Manoj Bajpayee is 54 years of age, but the emotional cord that ties him to Belwa, the village he left at 18, has still not frayed in the 36 years that have passed. As 2023 crossed over into 2024, the accomplished actor took his family to spend a few days there. The joy of spending time amidst memories as old as childhood there was offset this time by nostalgia and emptiness: both his parents are no longer there.

Our photographer shadowed Manoj in Belwa (in Bihar’s West Champaran) as he spent time switching off and reminiscing to bring you a rarely-seen side.

There are so many memories. I was born and brought up in this village. I studied till the third standard in the same school, which I often visit. It is barely half a kilometre from my place. Taking bath in the canal and river, getting scolded for staying out in the sun in summer… The winters used to be so lovely. We would go to the India-Nepal border just for a picnic with my brothers and sisters or friends. There are so many memories… I will have to write a book for them!

The people here, what you see in the photos, they were actually very conscious because there was camera. Otherwise, they are very, very comfortable. They don’t treat me as someone who is well-known but as someone who is from their village, and we connect on that level – be it a small child or a very old man who has seen me growing up. It’s literally going back home.

Although a home is made when your parents are there (pauses) – and when I go back now, I feel an immense amount of grief when I don’t see them there (Manoj’s father passed away in October 2021 and his mother in December 2022). I can’t even explain the nature of the grief I feel inside. But that’s the rule of the universe; you come and you go, and this is what I tell myself, and I try to get out of it.

The question actually says a lot about the plight and the tragedy of being a refugee in your own homeland. For a job, and to chase your dream, you leave your near and dear ones. You go the big cities looking for the opportunity, and you are still not ‘settled’. You always feel like an outsider – that’s the psychology of every refugee who has left his place or got displaced for whatever reason. He never belongs to the place he is working at, and when he comes back, there also, he is always looked at as somebody who is different or who has become different. No matter how easy or comfortable that person is back in his place, it is a continuous struggle that the person goes through. It’s the same with me.

You remember your village. You remember your time in the village, you remember the time you left and how heavy it was on your heart. You remember how many nights you cried and sobbed thinking about your parents… With me it has been very... I’d say I left them when I was 18 and a half, and then after that, I only visited my place, never really stayed with them. After every year, or after two years, whenever I used to visit, those wrinkles increased, and that used to break my heart. And now they are no more. In the process of chasing my dream, I lost my time with my parents. I really don’t know when they really got old and when they passed away. That grief, that sadness on not being with them has been really, really heavy on my heart and my mind.

But you know, that’s how life is. If I look at it from a distance, on the other side, and I think if I had not left my village to chase my dream, many of my siblings wouldn’t have left either. Many of the district’s young people wouldn’t have left to chase their dreams, and wouldn’t have believed in themselves. Yes, if Manoj Bajpayee can, you can. So many things changed just because one person from that district gathered that strength and left the comfort zone, left his near and dear ones to fend for themselves. There are advantages and disadvantages to every action that you take. And I think I had to do what I did, not for anyone, but for my own self.

I have reached an age where a room with a bed and cupboard will do for me. I have never chased a luxurious life, and never chased anything else. I just wanted to express myself. I just wanted to (play) various characters. I just wanted to have a great filmography – that I have now, that I can really be proud of. And every day that I get up, it is the passion for work or acting that really makes me go again and again, and that is not going away easily. That will never go away in the coming time soon unless bones start giving up. The heart, and the willingness, and the intentions are still the same as the 18 and a half years old who left his village.

Mujhe toh gaon hi pasand hai. Lekin haan, gaon ja kar ke thoda bura lagta hai. Ab ghar mein woh baat nahi rahi jo maa-baap ke saath thi… woh bura lagta hai. That really saddens me a lot. My village house looks empty, no matter how filled up it is with my brothers, sisters and their children. It looks empty to me without my parents. It has lost its meaning completely.

Yes, I sit alone on my roof sometimes and just hear the sounds. And early morning, I just love to stand on the roof and see the happenings at a distance. It is a foggy time, so, it is far more beautiful and nostalgic for me. It’s the same sound – of a cycle passing by, bells are ringing. You hear some keertan going on in the village, some harmonium, some naal, dholak... there’s one guy on a motorcycle – earlier it used to be on cycle – he is selling surf or bartan (utensils), and he’s announcing on his small loudspeaker. Going in the village – all the lanes, coming to our area, Bajpayee household area, and taking a round, going away and you hear that sound fading out, fading away... so it’s so many things. More than thinking, I love to hear these sounds, because they remind me of my childhood. They remind me of my time that I lived there – all of those things, all of those experiences – I try to put into my performances. And for that reason, I want to go to these places – the villages. This is where real India lives. This is where the soul of our country resides. And if you can live that, and if you can experience that, it really gives you an edge in whatever you do in your life – I personally feel that.

I just wish everyone the best and wish that the world which is going through such a huge turmoil, will have peace sometime very soon. I also wish that everyone gets out of their own cocoon and becomes far more generous instead of just looking at things selfishly – materialism does all kind of things, and selfishness is something that has really bothered me. We have become less generous. May the New Year turn us into more generous people, may we help each other in finding peace.