Detective Byomkesh Bakshy shot in ‘real’ Kolkata

Filmmaker Dibakar Banerjee is making sure to retain the authenticity in his upcoming film Detective Byomkesh Bakshy. For one of the scenes in the film, the director insisted on shooting in a live location in Kolkata to give an edgy and gritty feel to her adaptation. However, this was not so easy for the production team.

“The location that he chose was next to impossible to shoot in - In the heart of Central Business District in Kolkata, also known as BBD Bagh or Dalhousie Square. It's a stone's throw away from the Governor's House, and also an area of highest security,” says the source adding “Moreover, to make it look like a street of 1943 was a gargantuan task, as apart from the magnificent structure of Central Telegraph Office (CTO), which has been standing in the same place since 1878, nothing else would fit in.”

However, the Kolkata Traffic Police, Kolkata Municipal Corporation & Central Tram Corporation (CTC), helped in making Dibakar’s dream a reality.

“On the day of the shoot the streets were swarming with more than 400 junior artists dressed in period costumes, jostling with 40 vintage vehicles of that era. Elaborate traffic diversion plans were carried out by Kolkata Traffic Police so that the normal life remains unaffected,” added the source.

It took them 18 non-stop hours to take a live street of 2014 back by 71 years and make it into a street of 1943. With the help of Kolkata Municipal Corporation they took off all the contemporary street structures, pavement railings, traffic posts, Trident lamp posts and replaced them with period correct structures. They repainted all the street signs, zebra crossing, water hydrants etc to what they looked like in 1943. They also got the real Traffic Police & Mounted Police personnel to don period-correct costumes of pre-independence India and got them to act out as themselves in the shot, for authenticity.

As if to add on the chaos, at the last moment news arrived that that Prime Minister was visiting the Governor House the same day. So the production team had to be in tandem with the SPG of PM's security regarding the Traffic movement, the source said.