My growing-up years were simply bliss, and I can remember having a great time. I was born in Bhatpara, a mofussil area of Bengal, and studied in Rahara Ramakrishna Mission.

My childhood was spent rambling about endlessly — and aimlessly — throughout the day, which invariably came to a close with a rebuke from my parents. I loved to fly kites and explore the countryside in the searing heat. Spending hours on end playing with tops, marbles and exploring farmlands were my other preoccupations. I never took kindly to studies and hence never paid much attention to it.

When I reached high school, martial arts became an obsession, followed by a passion for the theatre. My parents would scold me for not paying attention to studies but I didn’t care too much about that.

I lived in a huge joint family and, as a result, had a lot of cousins as playmates. One of my best memories is that of going out to pick mangoes during Nor’westers.

In fact, my family members used to call me gechho, as I was always climbing trees.

In our village, there used to be weekly haats (makeshift markets). Every week, I used to accompany my uncles to these haats, as I loved playing the lucky dip. The reason: there were sweets on offer as the prize, and I was a complete sucker for sweets.

Thus, every weekend I used to play the lucky dip, but never got lucky — until one day. That day, as I threw the ring, it went and landed on the number 40 mark, which meant I was entitled to 40 sweets as my prize. I felt elated that I had finally hit the jackpot! But when the shopkeeper — who was as young as I was — was handing over the sweets to me, I experienced more guilt than happiness receiving them, because my prize meant a huge blow to his meagre resources.