Sunetra Sarker Who Do You Think You Are?

Sunetra Sarker is an actress,

best known for her role as Doctor Zoe Hannah in Casualty.

You tell ITU they are taking this patient now.

Even if I have to wheel her there myself.

She got her first break at just 15-years-old,

when she appeared in Brookside.

-Hiya, Sam.

-What are you doing here?

-Come to spy on me like everyone else?

-No, I just wanted to see you.

Well I don't want to see you, all right?

I've always been really proud to say that I'm from Liverpool.

It's something that comes so easily to me.

The minute anybody says, "Where are you from?"

I say, "I'm from Liverpool." And I really like saying that, actually.

It's such a cliche, isn't it, a ferry across the Mersey!

And yet it's so nice.

Growing up was definitely an Indian household.

Mum always wore a sari, and a bindi on her forehead.

We only really ate Indian food, even Christmas dinner was Indian.

I preferred to be more British.

So, I would speak with a Liverpool accent.

As many British and English,

Anglicised things that I could bring into my life, I did.

Me and my mates were secretly buying Bovril soup,

which is, like, unheard of, because Hindus don't eat beef.

And I probably denied being Indian as much as I possibly could.

Mum's always been really good at talking about family

and it just used to go in one ear and out the other.

I wasn't paying attention.

I didn't really see any point knowing my history,

because we weren't in India.

I really wish I had paid more attention, because now I'm grown up,

I know it's not about being cool any more.

My family's all from India, and I actually like it.

I want to know more about it.

I know we've got a really important great-grandfather somewhere

in the family, who was a lawyer and wrote novels.

And he's talked about as a god, almost, in our family.

So, I suppose, now,

is a chance when I get to see if I can find out some of that,

some of that history that I didn't want to know back then.

Sunetra's parents settled in Liverpool after moving from Kolkata

in India a few years before Sunetra was born.

She's come to see them,

to find out more about her great-grandfather

on her mother's side, who was a revered figure in the family.

-Hello!

-Hi!

-How are you?

-Hi, Mum. Hi, Dad.

I want to have a little chat with you, Mum.

Dad, would you put the kettle on? You can do the teas.

You make a great cup of tea.

One sugar, please.

Let's go in, Mum.

OK, so what I've realised, Mum,

is that I don't actually know a lot about our family history.

So, before I start this journey,

I want to ask you to tell me the things that you've probably already

told me that I didn't listen to.

Where do I start from?

I can show you a picture of Ma and Dadu.

You have heard about him?

Dadu is my mum's dad.

Yeah. Your grandad. I mean, everybody talks about him.

-Which one is he?

-There he is.

OK. Is that you?

Yeah, that's right.

I can see that's you straightaway.

And this is a better picture of Dadu.

So, Dadu is this sort of character in the family

that you all talk about. What was his full name?

Doctor Nares Chandra Sen-Gupta.

He was the famous lawyer and novelist.

-He was a lawyer and a writer.

-A writer.

He was in touch with all the great literary figures of that time.

And even, Tagore, whose name you hear all the time.

-Yeah, I know him.

-Yeah, he knew him.

He's like the Shakespeare of India, isn't he, almost?

Yeah, yeah. And actually, Tagore wrote a letter to him.

-Saying what?

-It's almost a letter of apology.

Oh, you've got the letter?

I've got the letter here.

The letter to Nares from Rabindranath Tagore,

India's greatest ever writer,

has been hanging on a relative's wall for decades.

-Wow.

-And this is his signature.

What is he saying in this letter, "I like your books,

-"I like what you're writing"?

-No, no.

He's not saying that.

"I know that this kind of letter is not easy to write,

"very few people can write a letter like that.

"Sometimes trying to hurt each other,

"we get into... ourselves, into a trap.

"I hope now we have both come out of that."

So, I don't know exactly what he's talking about.

-"Trapped"?

-Maybe you can...

-..find out, yeah, maybe I can.

-Then we will know.

Did he have any brothers or sisters?

We just know his one younger brother and younger sister,

Charuprobha Sen-Gupta.

Who, actually, went to the prison at one time.

-What, his sister did?

-Yeah.

-Why?

Because she was involved in the freedom movement.

She was a very emancipated woman.

-How old was she?

-I don't know the exact story.

Oh, Mum, that's quite rock and roll, isn't it?

She went to prison. It must have been quite a big deal.

It seemed like it was a bit of a mystery,

behind what did that letter really mean?

So, that intrigues me, and it also intrigues me that there is a sister

of this great-grandfather of mine who went to jail,

for who knows what.

So, I think we might have to go to India to find out a bit more.

Sunetra is travelling to Kolkata, in India,

where her great-grandfather, Nares used to live.

HORNS BLARE

Wow, listen to that! Argh!

It seems to fit Kolkata so well, that noise, and these colours.

They just, sort of, work.

I remember visiting as a child, actually.

I do remember everything was, like, in super-colour.

And then you'd go back to England and it would just be drab,

brown and grey.

I am off to try and look into the letter that Mum showed me,

which was the letter from Tagore to Nares.

Maybe that letter can shed a bit more light

on what my great-grandfather was about.

In the early 20th century,

when Rabindranath Tagore and Nares lived in Kolkata,

the city was the capital of British India.

It lies at the heart of the ancient state of Bengal,

which was hugely influential across India.

-Hello, I'm Shamapita.

-Hi there, I'm Sunetra.

Sunetra has come to Tagore's family home, now a museum,

to meet literary historian Doctor Shamapita Mitra.

So, I've got this letter, which my mum gave me,

which is a letter from Tagore to my great-grandfather.

My mum's grandfather.

Tagore seems to be repenting that he has hurt Nares Chandra Sen-Gupta.

What seems to have been the problem

is that they had a series of letters exchanged,

and there was a debate about what literature could talk about,

and what it could not talk about.

Oh, like taboos? And what's not taboo?

-Yeah.

-So, give me an example of something

that my great-grandfather would have written

that Tagore would never have written.

-I mean, did he talk about sex?

-He did. He did.

And here I have a short story,

which is about a widow who does not lead a very conventional,

way of life.

Like, the ordinary widows.

It's quite scandalous. It's quite scandalous.

"If my hunger remains unsatisfied

"even after having consumed this noble man..."

This is borderline X-rated kind of stuff.

I mean, I don't know whether I'd have been allowed to read this,

-you know, in my mother's house.

-In the 1920s, this is quite radical.

-Yeah.

-It's not just in his fiction that he is talking about women,

he was also taking up this point in his essays.

"A housewife cannot be satisfied with little learning,

"we need to educate our housewives and mothers

"if we desire to make our country glorious.

"We need regular education, and the longer the training process is,

"the better." So, he was paving the way for women's rights before,

I suppose, people were even discussing women's rights.

These kinds of writings did make an impact.

Not too many people would talk about the fact that women were equal,

in terms of their rights, in terms of the choices that they could make.

That women too were human beings.

I felt quite proud to hear that my great-grandfather was a bit daring,

and he was going away from the norm.

And I think I recognise a bit of that in me.

I'm not your average anything.

I don't think I fit in a box quite as easily as some people do.

So, it really resonated with me, that.

Sunetra has discovered that her great-grandfather was a maverick,

who was using his writing to break new ground.

To try and learn more about the impact of his work,

she's come to the Lake School For Girls,

which was set up by one of Nares' daughters.

She's come to meet Doctor Jayanta Sen-Gupta.

-Hello. I'm Sunetra.

-Hello. I'm Jayanta. So nice to meet you.

Nice to meet you, too.

Actually, did you know your mum came here?

-My mum?

-Yes.

-My mum?!

-Yes.

-I thought she went to a different school.

Don't tell my mum I forgot that!

When Nares was living in Kolkata, at the start of the 20th century,

the city was part of British India,

which stretched all away from what is now Pakistan through India

and Bangladesh to Myanmar.

But people in India were increasingly looking to a future

free from British rule.

This Nationalist Movement was particularly strong in Bengal,

Nares' home state.

To try to stifle it, in 1905, the British divided Bengal in two.

Hoping the majority Muslims in East Bengal

and the majority Hindus in the West

would rise up against each other, rather than Britain.

That is clearly driven by a motive to drive a religious wedge

between Hindus and Muslims, and to undermine the Nationalist Movement.

And it is against that decision to partition Bengal in 1905

that your great-grandfather translated a very dangerous book,

the Bengali version is banned by the British.

And we're lucky to have an original copy of this translation.

Of his translation? Of that book?

-Of his translation, yeah.

-Oh, wow.

This is it. The novel is actually about one of the first rebellions

-against the British imperial rule.

-A real one or a fictional one?

A real one.

It also has Vande Mataram, which is India's national song.

Oh, yeah.

It's translated into English for the first time

and also appears in this book.

"Hail, thee, mother.

"To her, I bow..."

It's an ode to your motherland,

which the British considered to be extremely dangerous.

It eventually comes to be sung by other nationalists

across the Indian subcontinent.

And this song, sort of, was the anthem to that movement?

-Yes, it's the answer some of the Nationalist Movement.

-OK.

Nares had translated a song

which became a rallying cry for Indian independence,

and by translating it, he'd made it available

to a far wider audience, not just Bengali speakers.

Instead of pitting Indian against Indian,

the Partition of Bengal had backfired,

fanning the flames of the Nationalist Movement.

And if you read this, especially here,

you will see a reference to the singer of the national song,

-Vande Mataram.

-Oh, yeah.

"Official orders were issued that no procession could be allowed and that

"no organised shouting of the national song, Vande Mataram,

"or any other such cry should be permitted.

"One man was mercilessly beaten and thrown into a tank,

"another was felled senseless, bystanders in lanes were also

"assaulted by the police, who made a attacks upon them with clubs."

So, given the way that the police treated people

who dared to sing this song on the streets, would you then say it was

either foolish, or extremely brave, for somebody, to at that same time,

be translating the song.

Absolutely. Absolutely.

This is a book which is, you know,

a very dangerous book to touch,

at that time, and he's not only touching it, he's translating it.

So, he's addressing a wider-reading public,

who are getting the message of that book for the first time,

because of his translation. So, it's a huge, huge risk to take.

-It's high treason.

-I knew he was a feminist,

and he was very much into women's rights and education,

but I didn't realise he was at the forefront of politics as well.

He was very, very politically active.

He was in the thick of it.

-I'd like to see in here, something.

-OK. Yes?

Today, India's national song, Vande Mataram,

the rallying cry for nationalists originally translated by Nares,

is still sung at assembly in schools across the country.

Wow. Guest of honour, I feel quite...

-Yes, you are.

-I'm very flattered.

# Vande Mataram

# Vande Mataram

# Sujalam suphalam

# Malayajasitalam... #

Seeing the kids all lined up, looking pristine

and singing that song, it got me a little bit.

# Vande mataram... #

It, sort of, symbolises a lot.

# Subhra jyotsnam

# Pulakita yaminim

# Phula kusumita

# Drumadalasobhinim

# Suhasinim. #

Wow. That's amazing.

-Wasn't it?

-Thank you.

Thank you.

I was already proud to say, "Guess what, my great-grandfather was

"something to do with women's rights," but now, I'm finding out

that he brought the message to nationalists that it was OK

to fight against the British Empire.

And I'm really quite humbled to be part of that,

somewhere along the line, yeah.

Six years after the Partition of Bengal, in 1911,

the British finally gave in and reunited the state.

Nares' goal had been achieved.

But Nares had a younger sister, called Charuprobha,

who was also involved in the Nationalist Movement.

Sunetra knows from her mother that Charuprobha

went to jail for her beliefs.

And she's managed to get hold of her biography.

By the 1920s, support for the Nationalist Movement was becoming

increasingly difficult for Britain to contain.

Mahatma Gandhi was emerging as an inspirational leader

in the movement.

So, "Charuprobha met Gandhi for the first time in the beginning of 1931.

"She later recorded this meeting in writing."

Oh, wow. "A long nurtured dream of mine was fulfilled,

"when we entered the room we saw him sitting on the floor,

"a vision of absolute grace.

"We all touched his feet, which is a show of respect for the elderly.

"He greeted us all with a smile on his face.

"I had a request for Gandhiji, and was wondering how to initiate that."

She's brave, wow.

"When the time came for us to leave

"I solicited my appeal to him, 'Bapuji, I have a request for you,'

" 'if while at work, I have any question

" 'or face difficulties to take decisions, may I write to you?'

"He gracefully nodded his head and said, 'Of course.'

"It was beyond my imagination that I would, without much of an effort,

"receive such an award."

She's got guts, to meet Gandhi is a big deal.

It's great. It's such an honour.

To find out whether her great-great aunt Charuprobha

ever took Gandhi up on his offer of advice...

..Sunetra has come to meet Sarmistha Dutta Gupta,

an expert on the role of women in India's independence movement.

Hi, Sarmistha. Shall we sit down? I've got some questions to ask you.

-Of course, yeah, yeah.

-So, I've got some information that I found out

about my great-grandfather's sister, Charuprobha Sen-Gupta.

I think one of the most amazing paragraphs I read was about the fact

that she actually met Gandhi.

And I'm intrigued to know, did she get in touch with him again?

-Do you know?

-Absolutely.

She did. They were in touch through letters, and in person, also.

She met Gandhi a couple of times more after that,

-just look at this photograph.

-No way, is that her?

-Yes.

-It wasn't just a couple of letters then?

-She actually met him again and...?

-Yes, yes.

I can't believe that is somebody in my family.

Honestly, I could have joked about this with friends and family, about,

"Oh, I wonder if I'm connected in any way to Gandhi."

And here I am, actually seeing my great-grandfather's sister...

Absolutely, let me show you,

there were many letters that Gandhi and Charuprobha exchanged.

-No!

-This was written some time in 1934.

-This is a letter?!

Yeah.

"My dear Charuprobha, nonsense.

"You must not give way to despair like that,

"let us work knowingly and voluntarily, not for self,

"but for the whole of humanity.

"And we shall surely see God face-to-face.

"This don't write doleful letters to me,

"just begin the service that easily comes to you,

"and you will soon expand and find joy.

"Love, Bapu."

-He was like, mentoring her.

-Absolutely.

-Wasn't he?

It blows me away, slightly. How have you found these?

Where have these letters been?

They are all preserved in the National Archives of India.

Charuprobha, she had emerged as quite a powerful local leader.

She's very much out there in the public sphere.

Giving speeches, taking part in nationalist marches.

And also going to jail.

I keep forgetting she went to jail,

because there's just so much more about this whole story.

She was arrested three times, actually.

This is a newspaper announcement of her first arrest.

"Lady arrested. Charuprobha Sen,

"a prominent lady worker of the district,

"was arrested by the police."

She was arrested for, you know, giving what the police called,

"Treason inciting speech."

And then she was arrested twice later,

the next time was in 1932, when, actually,

she was imprisoned for nearly 16 months.

-What? 16 months?

-Yeah, absolutely.

This is a pointer to the kind of sacrifices and the challenges

that, you know, Charuprobha and women like her,

who participated in the Nationalist Movement,

actually had to take on themselves,

service to the nation was more important to her

than anything else.

After Charuprobha had devoted decades of her life

to the Nationalist Movement,

in 1947, India finally won its independence from Britain.

You can take a look at this photograph,

-it's actually quite late in life.

-Oh, wow.

After India's independence, she was very active,

always working for social change.

She looks like a strong woman.

-She does.

-She'd fight her own corner.

-Yeah.

I don't know if everyone realises,

but being connected in any way to Gandhi is really sacred,

and that's what I take from this,

I had a great grand aunt, who was so important

that she was connected to Gandhi,

and a great-grandfather, who was her brother,

and who did so much, and it just makes me feel

like I'm such a small piece of this big puzzle.

To see if she can find out more about Nures or his sister,

Sunetra has come to meet a distant cousin, Sirkanya,

whose mother kept a treasure trove of family memorabilia.

How are you? Tell me where we're going?

-We're going to Santiniketan.

-Yay!

-And we're taking a train.

Really? It's been, like, 30 years since I've been on a train.

-30 years!

-To Santiniketan.

-And Santiniketan, too?

-All right.

I'm so glad you're my tour guide.

Sirkanya is taking Sunetra north of Kolkata to Santiniketan,

to the house where Sirkanya's mother,

one of Nares' daughters, used to live.

-Look at the smile.

-Oh, no. I wish I didn't.

What was I thinking?

Look at you, with your glasses. I remember those really big glasses.

That was probably the last time I went to Santiniketan. I was 15.

Someone's coming along.

I want to see him make it. Will you make one for me?

It smells divine.

This is the house.

Yes!

My mother left the house in 2008.

-Mm-hm.

-And she's got a lot of old stuff from the family.

Ten rupees. Look at that.

So, tomorrow morning, can we go there and have a little look?

-We'll go there.

-Fantastic.

So, do you recognise any of this?

-This is it.

-Yeah.

-We're straight there. Oh!

-This is it.

-Yeah, it has built up a lot more.

-Yeah.

No-one has lived in the house since Sirkanya's mother passed away,

leaving her family archives stored here.

When you're older.

-That's right.

-I thought, when I was little, this was huge.

-OK, do you remember this room?

-I think I do, slightly.

Part of me wants to say, "Yes, I do."

But I don't, not 100%.

OK.

Wow, look at these books.

I mean, it's like we've walked into a museum. I mean, look at that.

Eight years it's been empty.

We come, off and on.

-That's Nares again.

-Nares again.

So, where is this box of goodies?

OK, all right, let's see.

I know she's very organised.

I was expecting a cupboard of saris and jewellery,

maybe a few books and stuff,

but this is the most organised admin library ever.

I know! Here are the ones that say Baba Ma.

OK. Oh, wow.

So, look at this.

So, this is a duplicate copy of the passport.

Maybe have a little look at what it says.

It says, "Mr Nares Chandra Sen-Gupta.

"Accompanied by his wife, Mrs Labanya Prabha Sen-Gupta.

"Maiden name, Baskshi."

Oh, my God.

I've never seen a picture of him this young,

and I've never seen a picture of her.

It's funny, because I didn't have any idea what she might look like.

So, hang on, let me see this. Place and date of birth, Kanthalia?

Kanthalia.

So, she came from Kanthalia.

-And he was from Bansi.

-Bansi. Right, but look at this,

-visible distinguishing marks...

-What's the visible distinguishing?

So, his visible distinguishing marks.

-Read it out to me.

-"Black spot on left side of forehead."

-OK.

-And her distinguishing visible marks was,

"Mole, left forearm."

-OK.

-And he was five foot ten, and she was four foot nine.

I think I've heard this from my mother,

she used to sit on the chair and her legs wouldn't reach the ground.

-And that photograph's incredible.

-That's amazing.

Incredible.

-I like that. OK, let's keep going. What else is there?

-That's amazing.

Let's see. So, this is all falling apart,

so we have to be very careful.

-What's that, letters, 30 letters?

-This is very sweet...

-Special.

-..because she's written, "My dear Babu,

"So, I cannot tell you

"how much I miss you, even being away from you,

"like, these few days."

That might be early on in their relationship.

No, I think this is not that early on,

because they were like that all through, apparently.

Really? You just don't think of your great-grandparents being so romantic

-and loving and...

-They were very loving.

Maybe she was the impetus for him to understand how women

-should be treated, and the force behind him.

-It's possible.

Yes.

Take a look at this.

"Lower primary scholarship pass certificate."

This is a school certificate.

-1895.

-1895.

-Does that says, "son of"?

-"Daughter of."

So, they've crossed that out, and put, "daughter of."

-Of?

-"Bipin Bihari Bakshi."

Bipin Bihari Bakshi.

So, that's the name of my great-great grandfather?

-Yes.

-And pupil of Kanthalia Primary School.

I noticed that on the passport as well it said,

"Birthplace, Kanthalia."

Where is that?

This is in, now, Bangladesh.

That is in Bangladesh?

So, she was from, what is now Bangladesh,

-but was then part of India.

-That was all Bengal.

Were they both from Bangladesh?

They are both from Bangladesh, because even here,

it says, "Bansi."

And that's also in Bangladesh.

So, the whole family, really, came from that side of India at the time.

-Right.

-So, if we wanted to find out who she was as a youngster,

or who Bipin Bihari was, we'd have to go to Kanthalia.

-Kanthalia. Yes.

-Kanthalia.

Sunetra has discovered that her great-grandmother, Nares' wife,

was called Labanya, and her great-great grandfather

was Bipin Bihari Bakshi.

My mind is whirling.

I came thinking I was going to be discussing

maybe one member of my family, finding out a bit more about it,

but now I've got a face, of a great-grandmother

that I didn't even, I didn't even think about.

It would be nice to find out more, to see how much further we can go.

Maybe we can trace Bipin, my great-great grandfather.

Kanthalia, where Sunetra's great-grandmother was born

and went to school, is a village in Bangladesh.

A couple of hours drive from the capital, Dhaka.

HORNS BLARE

Oh, my God!

Nerves of steel to drive around here.

We are actually getting hit by cycles.

What's really striking me is just the stark difference

between where I was born,

and where my great grandparents were born.

It's just like we're planets away.

Kanthalia is home to around 600 Bangladeshi families.

But when Sunetra's great-grandmother was at school here,

Bangladesh was known as East Bengal, and was part of British India.

It's so, sort of, simple, and very basic.

Sunetra has arranged to meet historian Doctor Asher Islam,

to see if she can find out anything more

about her great-grandmother, Labanya.

-Hello.

-Hello.

-You must be Asher.

Yes, I am. And you must be Sunetra.

-Yes.

-It's so nice to meet you.

So nice to meet you. I can't tell you what this feels like.

It is a bit of a dream, a dreamlike scenario for me,

to be standing where, I think, my great-grandmother was brought up.

So, I've got something I want to show you.

I never thought I'd be holding,

but it's my great-grandmother's school certificate.

Oh, my goodness.

-This is so wonderful.

-I know.

And it says on here, you know, it's crossed out, "son of,"

-and it's made, "daughter of."

-"Daughter of," yes.

Yes, because in the second half of the 19th century,

it was not normal for daughters to go to school.

I can tell from the certificate that she came from a very liberal family,

a very enlightened family.

How would you know that?

Because this is proof that her father

felt that girls should have an education.

Wow. That's been a theme, you know.

That's been such a theme in my journey and discovery.

From the very name, Bipin Behari Gupta Bakshi,

the very title says that, you came from an aristocratic family.

This Gupta Baskshi title is aristocratic title.

-No!

-It's the title of the landowners.

This land document,

it shows the area of the homestead of the Bakshi family.

So, there are one, two, three, four houses,

which comes to the total area of six acres,

and a family which lived in a homestead of six acres

would have hundreds of acres of cultivated land.

So, what you are saying is, if you have six acres of homeland,

you'd have far more around you.

Hundreds and hundreds of acres of farming surrounding that house.

Like farming? I see.

-Wow!

-It shows that they were in a big landed family.

They were a big-landed aristocracy.

That's something I didn't know, for sure.

They were, we call it, "zaminder."

The landlords of the homestead.

This is the name, Bipin Bihari Gupta Bakshi.

This is your great-great grandfather and there are five names here,

who are the sons of Bipin Bihari Gupta Bakshi.

The first son is Jagadish Chandra Gupta Bakshi.

So, these are Labanya's brothers?

Her brothers.

Sunetra has discovered that her great-great grandfather,

Bipin Bihari Bakshi was the landlord of Kanthalia Village.

And his eldest son, Labanya's brother, was Jagadish -

Sunetra's great-great uncle.

The house would be the best house in the village,

the best house in the surrounding villages.

They would have had clean drinking water.

I get the picture.

They were treated very well.

They were the kings of the area.

You know, a zaminder is actually the king of this little area.

-No.

-Yes.

And you can get a glimpse of how good a lifestyle they had,

this is an article about your great-grandmother, Labanya,

wrote in around 1920.

This is her memories of her childhood.

-No way.

-Yes.

-The one thing I'd really like to know...

Gosh, it's making me quite emotional.

..is that I'd like to have known what she was like.

Because I'm all about emotions, and I deal with emotions as an actor.

-These are her very words.

-I was hoping I'd find something

that would, at least, give me an idea of what she was like.

This is gold dust to me.

-It is.

-And to my mum and to so many other people, I can't tell you.

-I'll save that, thank you.

-You're welcome.

"Our house is next to the river, there's a place for guests to stay.

"That's why all travellers go via our river.

"The boats on the river looked like reflections of the sky on the water.

"The boats are packed with people, families, men, women and children.

"One can hear them singing, playing instruments and chanting hymns.

"It is a pleasure to watch them have fun.

"Young boys and girls get wet in the rain and sing monsoon songs.

"Girls steer some of the boats themselves.

"I've seen them rowing the boats with oars.

"In the entire year,

"we used to look forward to this happy time of the year.

"Now, so many days pass by. Where does one find joy of that kind?"

Sunetra has come to meet Narayan,

one of the oldest people in Kanthalia,

to see if he remembers anything about her family.

-Nomoshkar.

-Nomoshkar.

-Nomoshkar, nomoshkar.

-Hello.

-Apni kemon achhen?

-I'm very well.

-How are you?

-Fine, fine.

My mother's grandmother was Labanya Prabha.

And Labanya's father was Bipin Bihari Bakshi.

Did you ever know them at all?

That's my great-great-grandfather's name.

You don't look old enough to be able to remember him.

How old are you?

-92.

-Wow!

Do you think you ever met Labanya?

It's amazing that I've found somebody...

You feel like you know me.

-I understand, yes.

-You understand?

I am understanding.

So, they did treat you well?

Uh-huh.

Sunetra has discovered that when her great-great-grandfather

Bipin Bihari died, after Labanya had moved to Kolkata,

Jagadish became the landlord of Kanthalia.

So, where exactly did they live around here?

Do you know?

It's still here now?

Yes. Will you take me?

That would be so nice, thank you.

You lead the way.

This is great.

He's bringing a stick. OK.

That's reassuring.

OK. I'm coming. I'm right behind you.

Oh, wow.

It must have been so beautiful.

I can see a tiny bit of cornicing,

which suggests there was some incredible carving on the ceiling.

It sounds like this was a really, opulent, grand, special,

big home where everybody came.

And a temple, like this, to be built.

That was the entrance? That was how you got in?

A huge room there.

It makes me feel like I must be walking in the space that

Bipin and Labanya and her brothers and sisters all walked in,

and maybe even my grandmother may have visited here with them

and been in this house.

Ah?

Let's see.

I've never been a brave explorer.

But this, I want to walk up the stairs.

I might be the last member of the family

that gets to walk up these stairs.

How amazing, for me to be able to get up here and, you know,

see where they used to live. It's huge.

It's absolutely huge. And this is just the bit that I can see.

Oh, wow.

Just by the river.

I don't even know what I've just walked through, I feel such...

such a rush of history and walking back in time, almost,

going through the house that is obviously decrepit, and so walls,

but used to be palatial.

And a house which entertained everyone in this area.

I'm getting the feeling that, you know,

my family was in some ways so revered, so kind,

and they helped each other. It just made me,

I had a bit of a revelation of my own,

which is that I didn't really like talking about the fact

that my grandmother died in a really horrific way.

She was cooking, and her sari caught fire, and she died.

And the whole family, nobody really talks about that,

but she was really special to a lot of people.

That was just my grandmother. So, I never looked beyond her.

And I think, if she knew that I was walking

through her grandfather's house, she would just be...

I think that would just make her so happy, and my mum.

So, why is it like this now?

The seat of Bangladesh's independence was sown

when India became independent in 1947,

as two separate countries - India and Pakistan.

But Pakistan itself was split into two provinces, 1,000 miles apart.

And today's Bangladesh was known as East Pakistan.

By 1971, when Sunetra's great-great uncle Jagadish

was master of the family house,

politicians in East Pakistan were calling for independence.

THEY CHANT IN OWN LANGUAGE

In response, West Pakistan launched a brutal war.

Sunetra has come to Bangladesh's National Martyrs Memorial

to find out about the war.

Let's sit down, and I'll show you some documentary evidence

-of what actually happened.

-OK, yeah.

She's meeting Aly Zarker,

who helped to set up Bangladesh's Liberation War Museum.

And this is a huge article that appeared in the Sunday Times,

-June 20th 1971.

-OK.

And you will get a brief idea about what it was like when we were being

pursued by the Pakistani soldiers.

"I witnessed, at close quarters, the extent of the killing.

"I heard the screams of men, bludgeoned to death.

"I have witnessed the brutality of kill and burn missions.

"I was repeatedly told by senior military and civil officers

in Dakar, 'We are determined to cleanse East Pakistan

" 'once and for all of the threat of secession,

" 'even if it means killing off two million people.'

"The West Pakistan army in East Bengal is doing exactly that,

"with a terrifying thoroughness."

Where were you living when this was going on?

Dakar. I left my home.

I was part of the freedom fighters.

-But you chose to fight for the right reasons?

-I chose to fight,

because I feel like I didn't want to live like this, subjugated.

Do you know what astonishes me, is that we're talking about 1971.

That's, just like, that was only, like, back then.

It was just before I was born.

It just feels too recent to hear about something as gruesome

and harrowing as that.

Most of the ordinary soldiers were not enlightened or educated.

I was witness to at least one interrogation

of one Pakistani soldier,

and this guy said that they were instructed by their officers

to go ahead and kill all Bengalis.

-Muslims and Hindus?

-Muslims and Hindus.

And rape the women,

through whom they'd be able to raise a new generation of children,

who would be true Pakistanis.

They were asked to father children.

-They were told to come over and...?

-Actually rape.

Actually rape the women, and then keep the women,

-in the hope that they were pregnant?

-In custody, yes.

They said that these will be true Pakistanis.

Let me show you another little document.

-This gets worse.

-This is by Doctor Nilima Ibrahim.

She had written a book called The War Heroine Speaks.

In which you will find testimony of the war heroines

who had survived this onslaught.

"One day, in the late afternoon, there was a scream.

"The military had arrived in our village.

"We were pulled out from the bedroom,

"I've resisted their pulling as much as I could,

"with whatever little strength I had in my small body.

"I changed places and captors many times since that afternoon.

"Sometimes I was alone.

"Sometimes with other girls.

"Every two months, they would allow us to shower for their own needs.

"We were not allowed to wear saris.

"It is not because they hate saris,

but that some girls used saris to commit suicide."

-Absolutely.

-"I used to think, whichever way it goes,

"the war needed to come to an end, either I would be alive or dead.

"But I needed to be released from this state of living death."

It is still contested whether the extensive use of rape

was actively encouraged by some military leaders,

or was an unplanned horror during a brutal war.

One which also saw Bangladeshi fighters commit atrocities.

But after nine months of fighting,

tens of thousands of women had been violated,

and hundreds of thousands of people, killed.

I feel quite gobsmacked, at how

I've never known about this war.

It seems to be something so significant,

and yet I haven't barely even thought

about Bangladesh as independent, or how it came about.

I think I'm a bit nervous to find out about,

at the same time, is what the relation,

or the effect of that was on the family

that I belong to in Kanthalia.

Sunetra has returned to Kanthalia to try to find out what happened

to her great-great uncle Jagadish,

and his family when the Pakistani army reached the village.

She's managed to track down Sushil,

the son of the local Hindu priest during the war.

So, what happened in 1971, to this village?

Eight-years-old?

So, do you know what happened to Jagadish?

When your dad returned, did he have any news about what might have

happened to them?

That's not what I wanted to hear.

So...

given that we know that Jagadish died,

what happened to the rest of the family that were living here?

I understand.

Sunetra has discovered that in May 1971,

two months into Bangladesh's war of Independence,

Jagadish, her great-great uncle, was murdered.

I've, sort of, submerged myself into this family,

this distant part of the family that I never knew of,

I've sort of grown quite close to them,

and wanted to know little bits, here, there and everywhere,

and now I know how horrifically, sadly, wrongly

somebody died in our family, that...

it's a bit of a blow.

But Sunetra doesn't yet know what happened to Jagadish's wife,

who was also living in the family house.

She's come to meet Vashanti,

who was a maid for the women of the house in 1971.

Hello. I'm Sunetra.

I've come to sit with you, and ask you some questions.

On that night, when you heard the news that Jagadish had gone,

what was it like here for the family? How did you all react?

So, did they stay here during the fighting?

OK. So, they did escape?

What did this letter say?

So, has there been anybody from that side of the family that's ever

returned to the village?

Keu? Nobody?

Aw!

I'm so proud to be that person, to come and say hello,

and to thank you for everything that you've done for my family,

years, and years, and years ago.

Thank you.

Do you know, you can just feel something really serene in here.

I'm going to offer some flowers,

because I know that my mum would be very proud of me if I did that.

Today, I will feed you all, like my ancestors fed your families.

And I will also be very happy.

We'll all be happy together.

Thank you.

You are very welcome.

-Next, next.

-Thank you.

You're welcome.

Thank you, very, very thank you.

Very, very thank you back.

This whole journey has been full of surprises,

I think I came blind, but curious.

Blind in a way that, I suppose, I'm quite ashamed to say,

because I was in complete denial

of my Bengali roots.

I think I was so keen to be a British girl, from Liverpool.

And I still am so proud of that,

but that was really what my identity began and ended with from me.

And now...

I couldn't be more Bengali.

I'm wearing Bengali clothes, I'm eating Bengali food.

I'm mixing with Bengali locals.

And I'm so very grateful.

I'm grateful to call myself Bengali, so I think...

I've got a new part to my identity -

thanks to everything I've learned.