Sixty-six year old Jharna Chitrakar grew up in Patharpratima in the Sundarbans. Her father, Akbar Patidar was a patachitra artist and as a child, Jharna would observe him as he worked. But she learnt the art only after she got married at the age of 13. Her husband and her teacher was master artist Niranjan Chitrakar, who passed away in 2014.  

 

She would at first help her husband to mix the plant based colours and later, paint the borders of his scrolls. Like other women patuas, she would also craft hand pinched clay dolls or Jou-putul as well as moulded dolls. It was only in 1977 that she received formal patachitra training, with her husband as guru, though she was not an “official” trainee. During the course of her training, she learnt to paint scrolls on the Satyapir, Chandimangal and Manasamangal themes. 

Meanwhile, she gradually learnt all the songs from her husband’s repertoire. Starting off with assisting him, and sometimes singing the songs for him, she was almost 35 when she began to work independently as an artist. According to her, the patuas of Habichak are more familiar with the older songs than their counterparts in Naya. 

Constantly honing her skills, and preferring to paint, rather than make dolls which was a time-bound activity, she went on to receive in 1992, the District and State Awards for her depiction of the French Revolution on a scroll.  

In the early days, husband and wife would move from village to village, entertaining villagers at fairs and selling their art. A chance meeting with the writer, linguist and folklorist, Suhrid Kumar Bhowmik, who along with the late David McCutchion was working on their seminal  book - Patuas and Patua art in Bengal, took place in the early seventies. Appreciative of their art, Bhowmik, who was a college professor, sent many of his students to their home. He also sent the couple to Kolkata to meet the folklorist, Deben Bhattacharya. This launched Niranjan and Jharna`s Kolkata connection and they continued to visit and sell their art at numerous private homes.

For 45 years, Jharna painted and sang, side by side with her husband. Today, as a widow, she continues to draw and sell pictures on her own. She has stopped participating in fairs as she does not find this economically viable. However, Jharna proudly tells us that her pictures sell very fast, especially her Bangla Patas, based on Puranic themes. 

Her three daughters, their husbands and two of her sons were trained in the art by her husband, while Jharna taught them the songs. Sadly, she lost her elder son, Tapan, a promising Patua, nine months before her husband died. Without the support of her husband, life has been a struggle for Jharna. She lost another son and of her three daughters and two remaining sons, it is her youngest son-in-law, Phojlu Chitrakar, who has made a name for himself. Phojlu had been thoroughly trained by his father-in-law, who had taken him under his wings, before getting his daughter married to him.   Of her sons, only the youngest, Gopal paints on a regular basis.    

Jharna continues to tutor her daughters in Patachitra songs and conducts informal classes in her village regularly where anybody who is interested is welcome.  Even though she has to cater to modern demands and thus paints the occasional social theme based patachitra encouraged by the government, Jharna`s heart lies in the scrolls with Puranic themes. 

Jharna also paints on greeting cards and T`shirts. She is particularly well known for her bright painted umbrellas. While she uses acrylic paints on textiles, she continues to use natural dyes collected from plants and herbs when they are in season and stored away in individual coconut shells.  She has travelled to Delhi, Bhopal, Rajasthan and Kerala and has received numerous awards and certificates, including state and district awards.