Veteran singer-songwriter Nachiketa Chakraborty has returned home a few days after being discharged from a private hospital in Kolkata, where he was admitted due to a heart-related problem. While resting on his hospital bed, pen and paper in hand, the artist quietly wrote down his thoughts: reflections shaped by life, rumours, and repeated brushes with death.
During his hospital stay, social media was flooded with prayers for his recovery, but also with disturbing rumours about his death. These moments stirred several questions in Nachiketa’s mind.
Speaking to Ei Samay Online, the singer said he is doing well now. However, what caught everyone’s attention was the title of his recent writing, 'Mrityu Mosto Phanki' (Death’s Biggest Deception).
Explaining the name, Nachiketa recalled how he had narrowly escaped death multiple times in his life.
He wrote that at the age of 15, he slipped from a bike, suffered a head injury, and slipped into a coma. At 20, during a protest in Maniktala against a bus fare hike, police firing killed a comrade standing beside him, a death he escaped only because of a sudden change in position.
He also recalled surviving near-drowning in an abandoned tunnel during the construction of the metro rail, being saved at the age of seven when a rope snapped as he tried to hang himself after watching a Khudiram Bose film, and nearly dying at six after setting his school on fire under the influence of Naxal movement fervour. At 47, he returned from the edge of death once again, this time from an operating table in a Delhi hospital.
Over the years, several false reports and rumours of his death have also circulated. Now, after surviving yet another health scare caused by heart rhythm issues, Nachiketa says he wrote this piece simply for people to read.
Addressing his audience, he made a candid appeal, “If you like it, keep the feeling to yourself. If you don’t, forget it. Don’t comment. I am not writing this for comments. On social media, I have already been declared dead more times than my actual lifespan. If there has been any mistake, forgive me. But next time you declare me dead, I promise I will try to die.”
