Murals of popular characters from Bengali fiction books adorn classroom walls

Kolkata: The classroom and stairway walls of state government-sponsored school, Jadavpur Vidyapith, has been transformed by a painter and few students to bring a sense of culture amongst students with murals of popular characters from classic novels like Apu and Durga from Pather Panchali and Shankar from Chander Pahar, amongst others.

Published in 1937, Chander Pahar (Mountain of the Moon) is a Bengali adventure novel written by Bibhutibhushan Bandopadhyay. The fictional character from the novel Shankar Ray Choudhuri is a young Bengali man from a village in undivided Bengal. He is smart and brave and has a penchant for adventures. Jadavpur Vidyapith headmaster Partha Pratim Baidya said that he wants the students to look at the mural and ask the question- Who was Shankar? This, according to Baidya, will guide them to read books, discover and embark on their own adventure.

This classroom will be named after writer Bibhutibhushan Bandopadhyay. Similarly, famous painters, artists and freedom fighters from the state have been selected to be featured in other classrooms as well. For instance a classroom used to teach class XI and XII students features paintings of Jamini Roy and will have his portrait outside the classroom as well. There’s a strong influence of other artforms like Warli art from Maharashtra and Alapana art from Shantiniketan as well.

The murals are painted by Alakananda Debnath with the help of a few students. Murals are often used to create beauty in an area, the headmaster hoped that it will make the students responsible enough to restrain themselves from the habitual scribbles on school walls.