Grandnephew confirms the originality of Bose portrait

In the end, like many controversies on social media, it ended up being much ado about nothing.

On Monday morning, social media was abuzz with claims that the portrait of Netaji Subhas Chandra Bose, painted by Paresh Maity and unveiled by President Ram Nath Kovind at Rashtrapati Bhavan on 23 January, was that of a Bengali actor who played the role of the Bose in a 2019 biopic.

The claim that the portrait was based on Bengali actor Prosenjit Chatterjee, popularly known as Bumba, who played Bose in a 2019 movie, Gumnaami, gathered momentum. It was retweeted by politicians including Mahua Moitra, TMC MP, West Bengal Congress, influencers and journalists.

Then, it emerged that the portrait was actually based on a photograph of the leader, and not on Chatterjee. Netaji’s grandnephew Chandra Kumar Bose who, last year, put out that photograph on Twitter, did so again and said this was the original on which the portrait was based. The actor and director of the film did not respond to calls or messages despite repeated attempts.