Black Diamond!!

Bengali Dick Tracy!!

Black Diamond

story: Dilipkumar Chatterjee

illustration: Narayan Debnath

The crime thriller set in Kolkata is a part of a series of crime novels

involving Indrajit Ray,our protagonist and his recurring villain Black

Diamond who keeps coming back at each volume to provide sleepless nights,

An escape of inmates from the prison prompts a series of bank heists

around the city which results in the return of Indrajit Ray from his

hiatus and eventually capture the goons through his innovative technique.

This pulp fiction comic book would remind the readers about a "Dick

Tracy"ish style comics. Narayan Debnath's illustration and compositions

give the comic book an almost black and white film like feel to it,and

thus transcends the readers to believing they were watching a crime

thriller. The storyline it self is extremely pulpish although slightly

abrupt at some moments but alltogether it is an original sounding classic

comic literature which seems to be fading away in Bengal.

I'm posting a few images from the book, do enjoy!!

Batul!!

Batul the Great

narayan debnath

A bengali comic book remains incomplete without a mention of the unforgettable Narayan Debnath and his favourite character "Batul The Great". Thus here is a slight review of a Batul the Great comic whihc appeared in the 1978 May edition of Shuktara.The story unfolds in an island where two mischiveous nephews of Batul hatch a plot to extract treasure from an other adventurer who is also in the same place for that purpose.While meanwhile Batul who is on the island on a holiday manages to seek out the cries of Help from the adventurer who has been trapped by his evil nephews as they plan to escape with the treasure.As usual our favourite Batul manages to save the day with his histronics.

The small simple plot where two gun totting kids manage to scare away an old man and the sudden appearance of Batul is what classical Bengali comic book narratives are made of.