Topshe Feluda's paternal (maternal in the first two stories) cousin Tapesh Ranjan Mitter, who is fondly referred to as
Topshe, is based on Arthur Conan Doyle's conception of
Dr. John Watson. In the first couple of stories, his surname was
Bose, but later it changed to
Mitra. Just like the former
army surgeon, Topshe is the quintessential accomplice and faithfully records each of Pradosh Mitter's exploits accurately. Topshe is a smart teenager. In the first story of Feluda series (i.e.
Feludar Goyendagiri), Topshe was thirteen and a half where Feluda's age was twenty-seven, just the double of Topshe. Though Feluda often teases his young cousin, he is extremely fond and very protective of him. Feluda lives with Topshe's family. Topshe's father, Binay Mitter is the younger brother of Feluda's father, and therefore his uncle, and they all reside at 21, Rajani Sen Road,
Kolkata-700029. Although there really is a 'Rajani Sen Road' in
Kolkata, the house number is missing. Formerly, they all used to live in Tara road, Kolkata. Though not mentioned explicitly, Topshe is good-looking, fair, tall and handsome, as per different illustrations made by Satyajit Ray himself. During Sonar Kella, Topshe was 5'5.5" tall (Topshe was two inches taller than Jatayu, who was 5'3.5"). But during Golokdham Rahasya, Topshe became taller and reached the height of 5'7". Detailed knowledge regarding Topshe's high school education is not available, but he used to go to school during the adventure of
Sonar Kella (the sixth book of Feluda series). In the film adaptation of
Sonar Kella, Topshe's mother shows her concern regarding his career and study as he spends much time solving cases with Feluda. By the time of
Kailashe Kelenkari (the ninth book of the series) he have had his secondary examination ('
Madhyamik Pariksha'). Just like Feluda, Topshe also used to read lot of books to enhance his knowledge. Topshe often gets his lessons from Feluda himself. In many cases, Feluda tests his deductive knowledge and he usually passes the test satisfactorily. In the movie
Sonar Kella Topshe's father aptly said that Topshe is a lucky boy who got Feluda as his mentor. Topshe is fond of '
Adventures of Tintin' comic series. In the book
Kailashe Kelenkari, he is found reading '
Tintin in Tibet'. Topshe always takes an active part in Feluda's adventure. Though in most cases, he follows Feluda's instructions or indications, there are instances where he himself gets involved into some action/investigation. To mention a few, he and Jatayu (a.k.a. Lalmohan Ganguly) sneaks into a warehouse in '
Patan' (Nepal) to discover vast collection of smuggled narcotics (book
Jato Kando Kathmandute); finds out the
stabbed body of a missing man in the woods (book
Darjeeling Jomjomat); replaces the pink
pearl with a fake for safe-keeping (book
Golapi Mukta Rahasya). The last incident impressed Feluda as well. However, all these activities mainly comes in the latter part of the series. He also interrogated the suspects in
Apsara Theaterer Mamla when Feluda was sick and
bedridden. Feluda solved the case just from the report of that interrogation. In movies and TV films the character of Feluda has been played by
Soumitra Chatterjee,
Shashi Kapoor,
Sabyasachi Chakrabarty and recently
Abir Chatterjee, while Topshe has been played by
Siddartha Chatterjee, Alankar Joshi,
Saswata Chatterjee,
Parambrata Chattopadhyay and
Saheb Bhattacharya over the years. In Sandip Ray's 2014 film
Badshahi Angti, actor
Sourav Das played the role. In Srijit Mukherjee's Webseries, Topshe was played by Kalpan Mitra and Feluda was played by
Tota Roy Chowdhury. In Arindam Sil's Webseries, Feluda was played by
Parambrata Chattopadhyay and Topshe by
Rwitobroto Mukherjee.
Lalmohan Ganguli or Jatayu Lalmohan Ganguli is a close friend of Pradosh Chandra Mitter, and is described as the author of a series of Bengali crime thrillers written under the
pseudonym '
Jatayu'. His crime stories and novels are usually derided as unbelievable, considering that his main character is always the superhero Prakhar Rudra. Though all his novels seem to have become best-sellers, he often tends to make extremely silly mistakes such as spelling
igloos as 'ilgoos'. In
Baksho Rahasya or
Incident on the Kalka Mail, he confuses
hippos with
walruses — a tendency that Feluda often tries to correct. He sometimes serves as a perfect foil to the group and in Ray's own words provides 'dollops of
humour', although he sometimes does some brave acts not expected of him. To mention a few, he knocked out goons in
Baksho Rahasya (using his
boomerang),
Joto Kando Kathmandute (using a
prayer wheel),
Tintorettor Jishu (using a packing box) and
Ebar Kando Kedarnathe (using a stick), which impressed Feluda as well. He owns a 'Madrasi green'
Ambassador car. Jatayu makes his first appearance in
Sonar Kella joining Feluda and Topshe in the train at
Agra, on their way to
Jodhpur. In the first two films on Feluda, which were directed by Ray himself, the character was played by
Santosh Dutta, and after the first one, Ray modified the literary character to some extent, making him look and behave quite like Dutta himself. In the next films directed by Ray's son, Sandip Ray, this character was played by
Mohan Agashe,
Rabi Ghosh,
Anup Kumar and
Bibhu Bhattacharya respectively. Jatayu also has a fantasy of collecting weapons. In various books he carried weapons like '
kukri' (Nepali
knife), and
smoke bomb. Jatayu lives at Garpar in
Kolkata, and it may be recalled that Satyajit Ray himself passed his childhood at 100, Garpar.
Sidhu Jetha Sidhu Jetha's formal name is Siddheshwar Bose. He is an aged character who has described himself to be like
Sherlock Holmes's brother
Mycroft, living in Sardar Sankar Road, Lake Market,
Kalighat,
Kolkata. He is a
bibliophile, and has an extensive base of general knowledge, current and historical affairs. He is a close friend of Feluda's father, being former neighbours in their ancestral village in
Bangladesh. Feluda's jyatha (that is,
uncle) is said to have a 'photographic memory', and is a vast source of information which comes in handy when Feluda is in need of some. His vast knowledge comes from his collection of varied kinds of newspaper clippings which he has accumulated over the years. The role was played by
Harindranath Chattopadhyay in
Sonar Kella,
Ajit Bandopadhyay in
Baksho Rahashya, Dibya Bhattacharya in Golapi Mukto Rahashya,
Haradhan Banerjee in
Kailashe Kelenkari and in
Gorosthaney Sabdhan and by
Paran Bandyopadhyay in
Double Feluda. Following recent Feluda films made by
Sandip Ray, Satyajit Ray's son, there have been questions over Sidhu Jyatha's continued relevance in the stories considering technologies such as the internet offer a faster, wider and more effective knowledge base than a well-read person.
Haripada Datta Haripada Datta is the driver of Lalmohon Ganguli's
second-hand green Mark II
Ambasador car. He is a loyal, intelligent and reliable person and is of great help when needed. He played a crucial role in
Gorosthaney Sabhdhan where he saved the lives of Feluda, Jatayu, and Topshe. He also has a minor role in
Boshpukery Khunkharapi, where he takes part in a surveillance mission with the rest of Feluda's gang in
disguise playing 29 cardgame.
Maganlal Meghraj Meghraj is a villainous character who appears in three Feluda stories, including
Joi Baba Felunath,
Joto Kando Kathmandute, and
Golapi Mukta Rahasya. He has been compared to
Professor Moriarty of the
Sherlock Holmes series.
Utpal Dutta immortalised this character in one Feluda movie
Joi Baba Felunath and a Hindi Feluda Telefilm
Kissa Kathmandu Mein, which
Satyajit Ray and
Sandip Ray directed respectively. After him
Mohan Agashe played this character twice in telefilms. Maganlal lives in
Benaras. He has a house in Joka, Kolkata. His son's name is Surajlal Meghraj. He is officially a money-lender but is involved in smuggling artifacts,
narcotics (through
Indo-Nepal border) and jewellery. His Kolkata house had been raided once but he escaped any charges until Feluda caught him red-handed in smuggling an invaluable Ganesh Murti (an idol of the elephant god) during the case of
Joi Baba Felunath. However, he was not behind bars for a long time. In the nineteenth book,
Jato Kando Kathmandute, Feluda said that he was not at all surprised seeing Meghraj out of jail as that was nothing for such an influential person. Once again he was arrested in charge of
murder and
smuggling, yet he averted any long term punishment and we saw him once again in the thirty-first story,
Golapi Mukta Rahasya. Maganlal is a good judge of human character. He lured
Bikash Singh, secretary of
Umanath Ghoshal, to steal the invaluable 'Ganesh Murti' from the Ghoshal-house. He also has a special interest in humiliating
Jatayu. In
Joi Baba Felunath he made Jatayu the subject of a knife-throwing play. In
Jato Kando Kathmandute, he purposefully slips an
LSD-laced
sugar cube in Jatayu's tea. In his third appearance, he made Jatayu to sing a Tagore song (which Jatayu said his first time experience of singing a song). Surprisingly, he shows a queer fondness to Jatayu and usually calls him 'Uncle'. During these three stories, we see many accomplices of Maganlal. Some of them are Machhli-Baba, Bikash Sinha, Arjun the
knife thrower, Anantalaal Batra, Dr. Dibakar and Manohar. Maganlaal has his own
Bajra by which he travels in Ganga near Benaras. The door of his house in Benaras is painted with figures of two swordsmen. During the making of the movie,
Joi Baba Felunath
, this swordsmen were painted by Satyajit Ray himself.
Pulak Ghoshal Ghoshal is a
Mumbai-based popular Hindi film director hailing from Kolkata. His original home in Kolkata is in the neighbourhood of Lalmohonbabu's in northern Kolkata's Garpar. He has directed two films based on Lalmohonbabu's stories. During the shooting of both these films, dangerous events took place, resulting in arrest of a producer in one film (
Bombaiyer Bombete) and arrest of an actor in another film (
Darjeeling Jamjomat).
Minor characters •
Srinath is the domestic help of Feluda and Topshe. He is often seen serving tea and snacks for Feluda and his clients. •
Jagannath is the household cook at Feluda's place. •
Bharadwaj is the household cook at Lalmohan Babu's place. •
Baikuntha Nath Mallik was a poet, tourist and Bangla teacher at Ethenium Institution where Lalmohan Babu used to study. When he was in the seventh grade, he won prize for reciting Baikuntha's poem on sea. Lalmohan Babu often describes him as a great poet who did not get the adulation he deserved. There is no presence of him in the story but in some stories we can see Jatayu reciting his poems. ==Stories==