Baishey Shravan (1960)

Set in a Bengal village just before and during the catastrophic famine of 1943 when some 5 million people died of starvation. A middle-aged hawker (G. Mukherjee) marries a beautiful 16-year-old girl (M. Mukherjee) who initially brightens his life.

Then, WW2 presses upon them and the famine hits Bengal as the couple’s marriage and the entire fabric of life disintegrates. The mother dies when the roof falls on her head in a violent storm; the marriage breaks up when Priyanath greedily eats up the little rice he can find in the midst of the famine, without leaving any for his wife.