Yojana Magazine August 2022 - 2 | Monthly Yojana & Kurukshetra Magazine (English) - UPSC PDF Download

 Page 1


YOJANA   August 2022 21
n ordinance was promulgated in 1876, 
empowering the British-run Bengal 
Government to ban performances of any play 
they found scandalous, defamatory, seditious, 
obscene, or otherwise prejudicial to the public interest. 
In no time, the Dramatic Performances Act, 1876 was 
imposed to check the revolutionary impulses of Bengali 
theatre. Playwrights who wished to attack the colonial 
rule soon turned to mythological plays to shield their 
nationalist messages to evade censor’s actions. With the 
heightening of the ‘Swadeshi’ movement at the turn of the 
19
th
 century, Bengali theatre tended to venerate the past 
more than any time before. It is in this context of fervent 
patriotic expression in the different art forms from the early 
days of the twentieth century that we need to review the 
role of Bengali cinema in reflecting the country’s freedom 
struggle.
In 1795, a Russian linguist and indologist, Gerasim 
Stepanovich Lebedev started proscenium drama in 
Calcutta, the then capital of British rule in India. These 
productions, translations of European plays in Bengali 
with native actors is arguably considered the pioneer of 
modern Indian theatre different from our traditional one, 
derived from Bharata Muni’s Natyashastra. During the 
middle of the 19
th
 century, the Bengali bard Madhusudan 
Dutt was involved with the theatre at Belgachia, which 
was a pioneer of modern, western-influenced theatre. Dutt 
Cinema as Vanguard of Nationalist Movement
Amitava Nag
The author is an independent film critic and one of the founding members of the film magazine, Silhouette and its current editor.
Email: amitava.nag@gmail.com
After implementing the Dramatic Performances Act in 1876, the British were quick to 
understand that cinema had a bigger potential to influence public opinion. Expectedly, India’s 
Cinematograph Act was passed in 1918 during the dying months of World War I, with effect 
from 1 August 1920. Based on the British Cinematograph Act 1909, the Indian version’s objective 
was nothing less than censoring the content of films to be exhibited for public consumption. 
With the advent of talkies, Bengali cinema drew its inspiration from the rich literary tradition viz. 
novels of Saratchandra Chatterjee, Bankim Chandra Chatterjee and occasionally, Rabindranath 
Tagore. The importance of content was observed since then, one of the reasons why in popular 
jargon, Bengalis even now refer to a film as a ‘boi’/‘book. ’
A
composed the play, Sharmistha, in the western style, in 
1858, based on the story of Debjani-Yayati of Mahabharata. 
It is considered the first original play was written in Bengali 
language. The following year, Dutt penned two farces: 
Ekei ki bole Sabhyata? and Buro Shaliker Ghare ro. While 
in the first, he satirises the addiction, disorderly conduct 
and immorality of the English-educated young Bengalis, 
in the second, he exposes the secret debauchery of the 
conservative and corrupt socialists of the conservative 
Hindu society. Although these socially aware plays were 
performed and appreciated, the first ‘Swadeshi’ play 
was Dinabandhu Mitra’s Nil Darpan that depicted the 
horrific tragedy of indigo farmers in rural Bengal and the 
resistance art
Page 2


YOJANA   August 2022 21
n ordinance was promulgated in 1876, 
empowering the British-run Bengal 
Government to ban performances of any play 
they found scandalous, defamatory, seditious, 
obscene, or otherwise prejudicial to the public interest. 
In no time, the Dramatic Performances Act, 1876 was 
imposed to check the revolutionary impulses of Bengali 
theatre. Playwrights who wished to attack the colonial 
rule soon turned to mythological plays to shield their 
nationalist messages to evade censor’s actions. With the 
heightening of the ‘Swadeshi’ movement at the turn of the 
19
th
 century, Bengali theatre tended to venerate the past 
more than any time before. It is in this context of fervent 
patriotic expression in the different art forms from the early 
days of the twentieth century that we need to review the 
role of Bengali cinema in reflecting the country’s freedom 
struggle.
In 1795, a Russian linguist and indologist, Gerasim 
Stepanovich Lebedev started proscenium drama in 
Calcutta, the then capital of British rule in India. These 
productions, translations of European plays in Bengali 
with native actors is arguably considered the pioneer of 
modern Indian theatre different from our traditional one, 
derived from Bharata Muni’s Natyashastra. During the 
middle of the 19
th
 century, the Bengali bard Madhusudan 
Dutt was involved with the theatre at Belgachia, which 
was a pioneer of modern, western-influenced theatre. Dutt 
Cinema as Vanguard of Nationalist Movement
Amitava Nag
The author is an independent film critic and one of the founding members of the film magazine, Silhouette and its current editor.
Email: amitava.nag@gmail.com
After implementing the Dramatic Performances Act in 1876, the British were quick to 
understand that cinema had a bigger potential to influence public opinion. Expectedly, India’s 
Cinematograph Act was passed in 1918 during the dying months of World War I, with effect 
from 1 August 1920. Based on the British Cinematograph Act 1909, the Indian version’s objective 
was nothing less than censoring the content of films to be exhibited for public consumption. 
With the advent of talkies, Bengali cinema drew its inspiration from the rich literary tradition viz. 
novels of Saratchandra Chatterjee, Bankim Chandra Chatterjee and occasionally, Rabindranath 
Tagore. The importance of content was observed since then, one of the reasons why in popular 
jargon, Bengalis even now refer to a film as a ‘boi’/‘book. ’
A
composed the play, Sharmistha, in the western style, in 
1858, based on the story of Debjani-Yayati of Mahabharata. 
It is considered the first original play was written in Bengali 
language. The following year, Dutt penned two farces: 
Ekei ki bole Sabhyata? and Buro Shaliker Ghare ro. While 
in the first, he satirises the addiction, disorderly conduct 
and immorality of the English-educated young Bengalis, 
in the second, he exposes the secret debauchery of the 
conservative and corrupt socialists of the conservative 
Hindu society. Although these socially aware plays were 
performed and appreciated, the first ‘Swadeshi’ play 
was Dinabandhu Mitra’s Nil Darpan that depicted the 
horrific tragedy of indigo farmers in rural Bengal and the 
resistance art 22 YOJANA   August 2022
British atrocities against them. The play written in 1859, 
portraying the contemporary indigo revolt, was staged a 
few years later in 1872 by Girish Chandra Ghosh. Ghosh 
established the National Theatre in the same year and the 
first performance of Bengali commercial-stage happened 
with Mitra’s controversial, yet poignant play.
Not far away, at the Tagores’, Rabindranath was 
exploring the ideas of spiritualism and individual identity, 
and in parallel raising questions on the collective vision 
of nationalism through Chitrangada (1892), Raja (1910), 
Dakghar (1913) and Raktakarabi (1924). Expectedly, Nil 
Darpan’s popularity go well with the British authorities 
who banned the performance of the play. The Dramatic 
Performances Act, 1876 was imposed to check the 
revolutionary impulses of Bengali theatre. The Act ensured 
that the flurry of nationalist plays after Nil Darpan which 
all rocketed to popularity, started to become rare. The 
police atrocities were rampant and the punishments severe. 
Interestingly, while the British came down heavily on the 
open ‘swadeshi’ theatre, they were somewhat indifferent to 
the mythological ones. 
With the heightening of the ‘Swadeshi’ movement at the 
turn of the 19
th
 century, Bengali theatre tended to venerate 
the past more than any time before. It 
was Lord Curzon’s implementation of 
the partition of Bengal in 1905 which 
served as fodder to strong nationalist 
sentiments amongst Bengalis. 
However, Curzon’s ‘divide and rule’ 
policy actually angered the Bengalis 
prior to 1905. In 1903, Kshirod Prasad 
Vidyavinod’s Pratapaditya reflected 
the latent wish of the race through 
Pratapaditya, a powerful zamindar of 
Bengal who raised his sword against 
the might of the Mughals to save Jessore (now 
in Bangladesh). Plays upholding religious unity 
alongside the strong wish of freedom from foreign 
forces seemed fervent. In the month of January, 1906 
itself, at the two leading theatres of Calcutta–– Star 
and Minerva, the following plays were staged and 
performed–– Kshirod Prasad Vidyavinod’s Padmini, 
Dwijendra Lal Roy’s Rana Pratap Singha, Amritalal 
Basu’s Shabash Bangali, Girish Ghosh’s Siraj-ud-
daula, and Haranath Bose’s Jagaran. The influence 
of Rajput heroes not only enriched the Bengali plays 
but also other literary forms notably by Dwijendra 
Lal Roy (whose song ‘Dhana Dhanye Pushpe Bhora’/ 
‘A land rich in grain and flowers’ from his play Shah 
Jahan remains to be one of the most popular patriotic 
songs till today). Incidentally, a year back, when 
Rana Pratap Singha was regularly been staged at the 
Star Theatre, mourning was observed on 6 September 
with no show or entertainment on that day.
In ‘Jatra’, the indigenous folk version of proscenium 
theatre without walls, the winds of patriotic vigour started 
flowing freely during that time. The most famous exponent 
of ‘Jatra’ was Charan Kabi Mukunda Das (original name 
Yajneshwar De). ‘Jatra’ had always drawn heavily from 
mythology. With Mukunda Das, there was a spread of 
political awareness that somehow complemented the 
problems in holding ‘Swadeshi’ meetings. The popularity 
of ‘Jatra’ amongst the masses ensured that Mukunda Das’s 
productions became big hits with the audience. Drawn 
between black and white representing evil against the 
good, these plays inescapably portrayed the British as the 
new form of evil in juxtaposition with Indian revolutionary 
symbolising the good. Born and brought up in what is now 
Bangladesh, Mukunda Das’s sweep was across the whole 
of undivided Bengal. His activities were soon termed as 
seditious and he was imprisoned particularly for a song– 
‘Chilo dhangolabhara, Shwet indurekorlo sara’, meaning 
‘The granary was full of paddy, The while mice ate it 
all.’ The ‘white mice’ refers to the British, obviously. 
Incidentally, long after the Swadeshi movement, Mukunda 
Das’s songs were popular even later during the Non-
Cooperation movements of the 1920s.
After implementing the Dramatic 
Performances Act in 1876, the British 
were quick to understand that cinema 
had a bigger potential to influence 
public opinion. Expectedly, India’s 
Cinematograph Act was passed in 
1918 during the dying months of 
World War I, with effect from 1 
August 1920. Based on the British 
Cinematograph Act 1909, the Indian 
version’s objective was nothing less 
than censoring the content of films to 
After implementing the 
Dramatic Performances Act in 
1876, the British were quick to 
understand that cinema had a 
bigger potential to influence 
public opinion. Expectedly, 
India’s Cinematograph Act  
was passed in 1918.
Page 3


YOJANA   August 2022 21
n ordinance was promulgated in 1876, 
empowering the British-run Bengal 
Government to ban performances of any play 
they found scandalous, defamatory, seditious, 
obscene, or otherwise prejudicial to the public interest. 
In no time, the Dramatic Performances Act, 1876 was 
imposed to check the revolutionary impulses of Bengali 
theatre. Playwrights who wished to attack the colonial 
rule soon turned to mythological plays to shield their 
nationalist messages to evade censor’s actions. With the 
heightening of the ‘Swadeshi’ movement at the turn of the 
19
th
 century, Bengali theatre tended to venerate the past 
more than any time before. It is in this context of fervent 
patriotic expression in the different art forms from the early 
days of the twentieth century that we need to review the 
role of Bengali cinema in reflecting the country’s freedom 
struggle.
In 1795, a Russian linguist and indologist, Gerasim 
Stepanovich Lebedev started proscenium drama in 
Calcutta, the then capital of British rule in India. These 
productions, translations of European plays in Bengali 
with native actors is arguably considered the pioneer of 
modern Indian theatre different from our traditional one, 
derived from Bharata Muni’s Natyashastra. During the 
middle of the 19
th
 century, the Bengali bard Madhusudan 
Dutt was involved with the theatre at Belgachia, which 
was a pioneer of modern, western-influenced theatre. Dutt 
Cinema as Vanguard of Nationalist Movement
Amitava Nag
The author is an independent film critic and one of the founding members of the film magazine, Silhouette and its current editor.
Email: amitava.nag@gmail.com
After implementing the Dramatic Performances Act in 1876, the British were quick to 
understand that cinema had a bigger potential to influence public opinion. Expectedly, India’s 
Cinematograph Act was passed in 1918 during the dying months of World War I, with effect 
from 1 August 1920. Based on the British Cinematograph Act 1909, the Indian version’s objective 
was nothing less than censoring the content of films to be exhibited for public consumption. 
With the advent of talkies, Bengali cinema drew its inspiration from the rich literary tradition viz. 
novels of Saratchandra Chatterjee, Bankim Chandra Chatterjee and occasionally, Rabindranath 
Tagore. The importance of content was observed since then, one of the reasons why in popular 
jargon, Bengalis even now refer to a film as a ‘boi’/‘book. ’
A
composed the play, Sharmistha, in the western style, in 
1858, based on the story of Debjani-Yayati of Mahabharata. 
It is considered the first original play was written in Bengali 
language. The following year, Dutt penned two farces: 
Ekei ki bole Sabhyata? and Buro Shaliker Ghare ro. While 
in the first, he satirises the addiction, disorderly conduct 
and immorality of the English-educated young Bengalis, 
in the second, he exposes the secret debauchery of the 
conservative and corrupt socialists of the conservative 
Hindu society. Although these socially aware plays were 
performed and appreciated, the first ‘Swadeshi’ play 
was Dinabandhu Mitra’s Nil Darpan that depicted the 
horrific tragedy of indigo farmers in rural Bengal and the 
resistance art 22 YOJANA   August 2022
British atrocities against them. The play written in 1859, 
portraying the contemporary indigo revolt, was staged a 
few years later in 1872 by Girish Chandra Ghosh. Ghosh 
established the National Theatre in the same year and the 
first performance of Bengali commercial-stage happened 
with Mitra’s controversial, yet poignant play.
Not far away, at the Tagores’, Rabindranath was 
exploring the ideas of spiritualism and individual identity, 
and in parallel raising questions on the collective vision 
of nationalism through Chitrangada (1892), Raja (1910), 
Dakghar (1913) and Raktakarabi (1924). Expectedly, Nil 
Darpan’s popularity go well with the British authorities 
who banned the performance of the play. The Dramatic 
Performances Act, 1876 was imposed to check the 
revolutionary impulses of Bengali theatre. The Act ensured 
that the flurry of nationalist plays after Nil Darpan which 
all rocketed to popularity, started to become rare. The 
police atrocities were rampant and the punishments severe. 
Interestingly, while the British came down heavily on the 
open ‘swadeshi’ theatre, they were somewhat indifferent to 
the mythological ones. 
With the heightening of the ‘Swadeshi’ movement at the 
turn of the 19
th
 century, Bengali theatre tended to venerate 
the past more than any time before. It 
was Lord Curzon’s implementation of 
the partition of Bengal in 1905 which 
served as fodder to strong nationalist 
sentiments amongst Bengalis. 
However, Curzon’s ‘divide and rule’ 
policy actually angered the Bengalis 
prior to 1905. In 1903, Kshirod Prasad 
Vidyavinod’s Pratapaditya reflected 
the latent wish of the race through 
Pratapaditya, a powerful zamindar of 
Bengal who raised his sword against 
the might of the Mughals to save Jessore (now 
in Bangladesh). Plays upholding religious unity 
alongside the strong wish of freedom from foreign 
forces seemed fervent. In the month of January, 1906 
itself, at the two leading theatres of Calcutta–– Star 
and Minerva, the following plays were staged and 
performed–– Kshirod Prasad Vidyavinod’s Padmini, 
Dwijendra Lal Roy’s Rana Pratap Singha, Amritalal 
Basu’s Shabash Bangali, Girish Ghosh’s Siraj-ud-
daula, and Haranath Bose’s Jagaran. The influence 
of Rajput heroes not only enriched the Bengali plays 
but also other literary forms notably by Dwijendra 
Lal Roy (whose song ‘Dhana Dhanye Pushpe Bhora’/ 
‘A land rich in grain and flowers’ from his play Shah 
Jahan remains to be one of the most popular patriotic 
songs till today). Incidentally, a year back, when 
Rana Pratap Singha was regularly been staged at the 
Star Theatre, mourning was observed on 6 September 
with no show or entertainment on that day.
In ‘Jatra’, the indigenous folk version of proscenium 
theatre without walls, the winds of patriotic vigour started 
flowing freely during that time. The most famous exponent 
of ‘Jatra’ was Charan Kabi Mukunda Das (original name 
Yajneshwar De). ‘Jatra’ had always drawn heavily from 
mythology. With Mukunda Das, there was a spread of 
political awareness that somehow complemented the 
problems in holding ‘Swadeshi’ meetings. The popularity 
of ‘Jatra’ amongst the masses ensured that Mukunda Das’s 
productions became big hits with the audience. Drawn 
between black and white representing evil against the 
good, these plays inescapably portrayed the British as the 
new form of evil in juxtaposition with Indian revolutionary 
symbolising the good. Born and brought up in what is now 
Bangladesh, Mukunda Das’s sweep was across the whole 
of undivided Bengal. His activities were soon termed as 
seditious and he was imprisoned particularly for a song– 
‘Chilo dhangolabhara, Shwet indurekorlo sara’, meaning 
‘The granary was full of paddy, The while mice ate it 
all.’ The ‘white mice’ refers to the British, obviously. 
Incidentally, long after the Swadeshi movement, Mukunda 
Das’s songs were popular even later during the Non-
Cooperation movements of the 1920s.
After implementing the Dramatic 
Performances Act in 1876, the British 
were quick to understand that cinema 
had a bigger potential to influence 
public opinion. Expectedly, India’s 
Cinematograph Act was passed in 
1918 during the dying months of 
World War I, with effect from 1 
August 1920. Based on the British 
Cinematograph Act 1909, the Indian 
version’s objective was nothing less 
than censoring the content of films to 
After implementing the 
Dramatic Performances Act in 
1876, the British were quick to 
understand that cinema had a 
bigger potential to influence 
public opinion. Expectedly, 
India’s Cinematograph Act  
was passed in 1918.
YOJANA   August 2022 23
be exhibited for public consumption. 
On top of it, this cinema from its birth 
has remained an expensive affair. It 
is in this context of fervent patriotic 
expression in the different art forms 
from the early days of the twentieth 
century that we need to review the 
role of Bengali cinema in reflecting 
the country’s freedom struggle. While 
the rest of India relied heavily on 
mythological and historical films even 
after talkies became the norm with 
Alam Ara in 1931, Bengali cinema already had socially 
relevant films starting with the silent Bilet Ferat in 
1921. However, unlike the other art forms which were 
familiar, cinema was new and dynamic. The migration 
from silent films to talkies, for example, was fraught with 
uncertainty and scepticism. An art form that is even now 
heavily dependent on the West, not only for the ever-
changing techniques but also for the raw materials no 
wonder intimidated the Indian filmmakers, including the 
Bengali ones of the time. The importance of cinema as 
a tool of propaganda was not envisioned by the British 
alone. In a Congress conference from 30 October till  
1 November 1939, at Calcutta, Netaji Subhas Chandra 
Bose advised the members from Faridpur district (now 
in Bangladesh) to form a film collective for the spread 
of cinema. Incidentally, the art magazine Rupamancha 
dedicated to film and theatre was one that started the 
same year. It was one of the earliest Bengali magazines 
that dealt with cinema.
With the advent of talkies, Bengali cinema drew its 
inspiration from the rich literary tradition viz. novels of 
Saratchandra Chatterjee, Bankim Chandra Chatterjee 
and occasionally, Rabindranath Tagore. The importance 
of content was observed since then, one of the reasons 
why in popular jargon, Bengalis even now refer a film 
as a ‘boi’/‘book.’ With the rise of Pramathesh Barua 
since the mid 1930s, the ascent 
of a star was introduced. Barua’s 
maudlin melodrama swept the elite 
Bengali audience although his films 
were also anchored in strong literary 
conventions. Since the turn of the 
new century, Bengal’s tragedy was 
manifold. The attempted partition 
of 1905 was followed by the shift of 
capital from Calcutta to Delhi in 1911. 
The manmade famine of 1942-43 was 
next in line and the severest at that time 
which shattered the Bengali confidence and emotional 
sanctity. Quite a few Bengali artists and filmmakers 
including Bimal Roy, Hrishikesh Mukherjee, and others 
started drifting away to a more stable and significantly 
more viable Bombay. The World War II that ended in 
1945 gifted dark despair to the whole India, including 
Bengal. Raw stock materials became expensive, black 
marketeers gained prominence. Studios including the 
most prestigious, the New Theatres, suffered losses and 
lost their enterprise. As per the data from Panna Shah’s 
1950 book, The Indian Film, between 1942 and 1945, the 
number of films in Bengali language reduced from 15 to 
9, almost becoming half. It is to be kept in mind that the 
film industry in Calcutta not only produced Bengali films 
but films in other languages as well. While films in Urdu 
and Tamil started drying up with the years, Hindi films 
were still being made. The War, the famine, the exodus 
from Calcutta to Bombay, all resulted in the industry 
becoming weaker by the day. The Bombay film industry 
had already established its monopoly of the pan-Indian 
market. In 1946, with a sudden buoyancy of raw money 
in the market, the Indian film industry experienced an 
unprecedented boom as Bombay produced 150 films 
(143 Hindi, 1 Gujarati, 2 Marathi, 2 Tamil, and 2 Telugu) 
vis-à-vis Calcutta’s meagre 23 (15 Bengali and 8 Hindi). 
The disparity widened in the next two years and apart 
from exceptions including Debaki 
Bose’s Chandrasekhar (1947), 
the Bengali film industry slowly 
moved into a strangulating cash 
crunch. It can be safely left for 
conjecture what could have been 
the future of the film industry had 
it not been the freedom of India 
that also meant the momentous 
partition of Bengal. The partition, 
apart from its psychological effect, 
impacted the very base of Bengali 
cinema’s home market.
Throughout the 1930s and 
1940s, Bengali cinema produced 
socially aware films which, as 
With the advent of talkies, 
Bengali cinema drew its 
inspiration from the rich 
literary tradition viz. novels 
of Saratchandra Chatterjee, 
Bankim Chandra Chatterjee  
and occasionally,  
Rabindranath Tagore. 
Page 4


YOJANA   August 2022 21
n ordinance was promulgated in 1876, 
empowering the British-run Bengal 
Government to ban performances of any play 
they found scandalous, defamatory, seditious, 
obscene, or otherwise prejudicial to the public interest. 
In no time, the Dramatic Performances Act, 1876 was 
imposed to check the revolutionary impulses of Bengali 
theatre. Playwrights who wished to attack the colonial 
rule soon turned to mythological plays to shield their 
nationalist messages to evade censor’s actions. With the 
heightening of the ‘Swadeshi’ movement at the turn of the 
19
th
 century, Bengali theatre tended to venerate the past 
more than any time before. It is in this context of fervent 
patriotic expression in the different art forms from the early 
days of the twentieth century that we need to review the 
role of Bengali cinema in reflecting the country’s freedom 
struggle.
In 1795, a Russian linguist and indologist, Gerasim 
Stepanovich Lebedev started proscenium drama in 
Calcutta, the then capital of British rule in India. These 
productions, translations of European plays in Bengali 
with native actors is arguably considered the pioneer of 
modern Indian theatre different from our traditional one, 
derived from Bharata Muni’s Natyashastra. During the 
middle of the 19
th
 century, the Bengali bard Madhusudan 
Dutt was involved with the theatre at Belgachia, which 
was a pioneer of modern, western-influenced theatre. Dutt 
Cinema as Vanguard of Nationalist Movement
Amitava Nag
The author is an independent film critic and one of the founding members of the film magazine, Silhouette and its current editor.
Email: amitava.nag@gmail.com
After implementing the Dramatic Performances Act in 1876, the British were quick to 
understand that cinema had a bigger potential to influence public opinion. Expectedly, India’s 
Cinematograph Act was passed in 1918 during the dying months of World War I, with effect 
from 1 August 1920. Based on the British Cinematograph Act 1909, the Indian version’s objective 
was nothing less than censoring the content of films to be exhibited for public consumption. 
With the advent of talkies, Bengali cinema drew its inspiration from the rich literary tradition viz. 
novels of Saratchandra Chatterjee, Bankim Chandra Chatterjee and occasionally, Rabindranath 
Tagore. The importance of content was observed since then, one of the reasons why in popular 
jargon, Bengalis even now refer to a film as a ‘boi’/‘book. ’
A
composed the play, Sharmistha, in the western style, in 
1858, based on the story of Debjani-Yayati of Mahabharata. 
It is considered the first original play was written in Bengali 
language. The following year, Dutt penned two farces: 
Ekei ki bole Sabhyata? and Buro Shaliker Ghare ro. While 
in the first, he satirises the addiction, disorderly conduct 
and immorality of the English-educated young Bengalis, 
in the second, he exposes the secret debauchery of the 
conservative and corrupt socialists of the conservative 
Hindu society. Although these socially aware plays were 
performed and appreciated, the first ‘Swadeshi’ play 
was Dinabandhu Mitra’s Nil Darpan that depicted the 
horrific tragedy of indigo farmers in rural Bengal and the 
resistance art 22 YOJANA   August 2022
British atrocities against them. The play written in 1859, 
portraying the contemporary indigo revolt, was staged a 
few years later in 1872 by Girish Chandra Ghosh. Ghosh 
established the National Theatre in the same year and the 
first performance of Bengali commercial-stage happened 
with Mitra’s controversial, yet poignant play.
Not far away, at the Tagores’, Rabindranath was 
exploring the ideas of spiritualism and individual identity, 
and in parallel raising questions on the collective vision 
of nationalism through Chitrangada (1892), Raja (1910), 
Dakghar (1913) and Raktakarabi (1924). Expectedly, Nil 
Darpan’s popularity go well with the British authorities 
who banned the performance of the play. The Dramatic 
Performances Act, 1876 was imposed to check the 
revolutionary impulses of Bengali theatre. The Act ensured 
that the flurry of nationalist plays after Nil Darpan which 
all rocketed to popularity, started to become rare. The 
police atrocities were rampant and the punishments severe. 
Interestingly, while the British came down heavily on the 
open ‘swadeshi’ theatre, they were somewhat indifferent to 
the mythological ones. 
With the heightening of the ‘Swadeshi’ movement at the 
turn of the 19
th
 century, Bengali theatre tended to venerate 
the past more than any time before. It 
was Lord Curzon’s implementation of 
the partition of Bengal in 1905 which 
served as fodder to strong nationalist 
sentiments amongst Bengalis. 
However, Curzon’s ‘divide and rule’ 
policy actually angered the Bengalis 
prior to 1905. In 1903, Kshirod Prasad 
Vidyavinod’s Pratapaditya reflected 
the latent wish of the race through 
Pratapaditya, a powerful zamindar of 
Bengal who raised his sword against 
the might of the Mughals to save Jessore (now 
in Bangladesh). Plays upholding religious unity 
alongside the strong wish of freedom from foreign 
forces seemed fervent. In the month of January, 1906 
itself, at the two leading theatres of Calcutta–– Star 
and Minerva, the following plays were staged and 
performed–– Kshirod Prasad Vidyavinod’s Padmini, 
Dwijendra Lal Roy’s Rana Pratap Singha, Amritalal 
Basu’s Shabash Bangali, Girish Ghosh’s Siraj-ud-
daula, and Haranath Bose’s Jagaran. The influence 
of Rajput heroes not only enriched the Bengali plays 
but also other literary forms notably by Dwijendra 
Lal Roy (whose song ‘Dhana Dhanye Pushpe Bhora’/ 
‘A land rich in grain and flowers’ from his play Shah 
Jahan remains to be one of the most popular patriotic 
songs till today). Incidentally, a year back, when 
Rana Pratap Singha was regularly been staged at the 
Star Theatre, mourning was observed on 6 September 
with no show or entertainment on that day.
In ‘Jatra’, the indigenous folk version of proscenium 
theatre without walls, the winds of patriotic vigour started 
flowing freely during that time. The most famous exponent 
of ‘Jatra’ was Charan Kabi Mukunda Das (original name 
Yajneshwar De). ‘Jatra’ had always drawn heavily from 
mythology. With Mukunda Das, there was a spread of 
political awareness that somehow complemented the 
problems in holding ‘Swadeshi’ meetings. The popularity 
of ‘Jatra’ amongst the masses ensured that Mukunda Das’s 
productions became big hits with the audience. Drawn 
between black and white representing evil against the 
good, these plays inescapably portrayed the British as the 
new form of evil in juxtaposition with Indian revolutionary 
symbolising the good. Born and brought up in what is now 
Bangladesh, Mukunda Das’s sweep was across the whole 
of undivided Bengal. His activities were soon termed as 
seditious and he was imprisoned particularly for a song– 
‘Chilo dhangolabhara, Shwet indurekorlo sara’, meaning 
‘The granary was full of paddy, The while mice ate it 
all.’ The ‘white mice’ refers to the British, obviously. 
Incidentally, long after the Swadeshi movement, Mukunda 
Das’s songs were popular even later during the Non-
Cooperation movements of the 1920s.
After implementing the Dramatic 
Performances Act in 1876, the British 
were quick to understand that cinema 
had a bigger potential to influence 
public opinion. Expectedly, India’s 
Cinematograph Act was passed in 
1918 during the dying months of 
World War I, with effect from 1 
August 1920. Based on the British 
Cinematograph Act 1909, the Indian 
version’s objective was nothing less 
than censoring the content of films to 
After implementing the 
Dramatic Performances Act in 
1876, the British were quick to 
understand that cinema had a 
bigger potential to influence 
public opinion. Expectedly, 
India’s Cinematograph Act  
was passed in 1918.
YOJANA   August 2022 23
be exhibited for public consumption. 
On top of it, this cinema from its birth 
has remained an expensive affair. It 
is in this context of fervent patriotic 
expression in the different art forms 
from the early days of the twentieth 
century that we need to review the 
role of Bengali cinema in reflecting 
the country’s freedom struggle. While 
the rest of India relied heavily on 
mythological and historical films even 
after talkies became the norm with 
Alam Ara in 1931, Bengali cinema already had socially 
relevant films starting with the silent Bilet Ferat in 
1921. However, unlike the other art forms which were 
familiar, cinema was new and dynamic. The migration 
from silent films to talkies, for example, was fraught with 
uncertainty and scepticism. An art form that is even now 
heavily dependent on the West, not only for the ever-
changing techniques but also for the raw materials no 
wonder intimidated the Indian filmmakers, including the 
Bengali ones of the time. The importance of cinema as 
a tool of propaganda was not envisioned by the British 
alone. In a Congress conference from 30 October till  
1 November 1939, at Calcutta, Netaji Subhas Chandra 
Bose advised the members from Faridpur district (now 
in Bangladesh) to form a film collective for the spread 
of cinema. Incidentally, the art magazine Rupamancha 
dedicated to film and theatre was one that started the 
same year. It was one of the earliest Bengali magazines 
that dealt with cinema.
With the advent of talkies, Bengali cinema drew its 
inspiration from the rich literary tradition viz. novels of 
Saratchandra Chatterjee, Bankim Chandra Chatterjee 
and occasionally, Rabindranath Tagore. The importance 
of content was observed since then, one of the reasons 
why in popular jargon, Bengalis even now refer a film 
as a ‘boi’/‘book.’ With the rise of Pramathesh Barua 
since the mid 1930s, the ascent 
of a star was introduced. Barua’s 
maudlin melodrama swept the elite 
Bengali audience although his films 
were also anchored in strong literary 
conventions. Since the turn of the 
new century, Bengal’s tragedy was 
manifold. The attempted partition 
of 1905 was followed by the shift of 
capital from Calcutta to Delhi in 1911. 
The manmade famine of 1942-43 was 
next in line and the severest at that time 
which shattered the Bengali confidence and emotional 
sanctity. Quite a few Bengali artists and filmmakers 
including Bimal Roy, Hrishikesh Mukherjee, and others 
started drifting away to a more stable and significantly 
more viable Bombay. The World War II that ended in 
1945 gifted dark despair to the whole India, including 
Bengal. Raw stock materials became expensive, black 
marketeers gained prominence. Studios including the 
most prestigious, the New Theatres, suffered losses and 
lost their enterprise. As per the data from Panna Shah’s 
1950 book, The Indian Film, between 1942 and 1945, the 
number of films in Bengali language reduced from 15 to 
9, almost becoming half. It is to be kept in mind that the 
film industry in Calcutta not only produced Bengali films 
but films in other languages as well. While films in Urdu 
and Tamil started drying up with the years, Hindi films 
were still being made. The War, the famine, the exodus 
from Calcutta to Bombay, all resulted in the industry 
becoming weaker by the day. The Bombay film industry 
had already established its monopoly of the pan-Indian 
market. In 1946, with a sudden buoyancy of raw money 
in the market, the Indian film industry experienced an 
unprecedented boom as Bombay produced 150 films 
(143 Hindi, 1 Gujarati, 2 Marathi, 2 Tamil, and 2 Telugu) 
vis-à-vis Calcutta’s meagre 23 (15 Bengali and 8 Hindi). 
The disparity widened in the next two years and apart 
from exceptions including Debaki 
Bose’s Chandrasekhar (1947), 
the Bengali film industry slowly 
moved into a strangulating cash 
crunch. It can be safely left for 
conjecture what could have been 
the future of the film industry had 
it not been the freedom of India 
that also meant the momentous 
partition of Bengal. The partition, 
apart from its psychological effect, 
impacted the very base of Bengali 
cinema’s home market.
Throughout the 1930s and 
1940s, Bengali cinema produced 
socially aware films which, as 
With the advent of talkies, 
Bengali cinema drew its 
inspiration from the rich 
literary tradition viz. novels 
of Saratchandra Chatterjee, 
Bankim Chandra Chatterjee  
and occasionally,  
Rabindranath Tagore. 
24 YOJANA   August 2022
explained above, seldom attacked 
British imperialism and oppression. 
In his seminal book Bengali Cinema 
(1991), Kiranmoy Raha explained the 
reason of absence— “In the thirties, 
the (revolutionaries) who gave their 
lives for their patriotic beliefs were 
loved and admired for their courage 
and sacrifice and became household 
names in Bengal. In 1942, the ‘Quit 
India’ Movement was launched. The 
nationalistic movement also acquired 
new social concepts which defined 
and gave utterance to the expectations 
of workers and peasants. But Bengali 
cinema of the period did not seem to 
notice any of these things. For socially 
conscious and politicised people, like Bengalis who had 
been in the vanguard of social, artistic, and political 
movements in India, this was surprising. Apprehension 
about films being banned under the censorship rules was 
no doubt a serious and weighty reason. But there is no 
reliable record of serious attempts having been made to 
make films which could circumvent the rules and yet get 
the message across.” In Cinema and the Indian Freedom 
Struggle (1998), Gautam Kaul went a step further and 
analysed – “The very limited response of Bengali cinema 
to the freedom theme must have other factors too…I 
attribute it to the disposition of those financers of Bengali 
films who preferred gambling their wealth more freely in 
races at Calcutta’s Royal Turf Club than in films on the 
freedom themes. Their business was sustained by contracts 
and dealings with British administration and could not 
afford to bite the hand that fed them their daily bread. 
Again, perhaps Bengali nationalism preferred to focus on 
the modernisation of society and religious reforms as a 
prelude to political self-assertion, a tradition which also 
found itself in other vernacular cinemas prominently.” 
Yet, there were a few attempts within the predominant 
silence to make patriotic films. Sushil Mazumdar was 
one director to notice who made films on contemporary 
politics mixed with social issues viz. Muktisnan (1937), 
Pratishodh (1941) and later after independence, Soldier’s 
Dream (1948), Sarbahara (1948) and Dukhir Iman (1954) 
to name some. Apart from these, Ardhendu Mukherjee 
made Sangram (1946), Sudhirbandhu Bannerjee directed 
Bande Mataram (1946) while Satish Dasgupta brought 
on celluloid Sarat Chandra Chatterjee’s Pather Dabi with 
the same name in 1947, five months before 15 August.
Understandably, it was just after the independence that 
several films were made that demonstrated the hardships 
of a captive nation. Films such as Bhuli Nai (1948, Hemen 
Gupta), Joyjatra (1948, Niren Lahiri), Chattagram 
Astraghar Lunthan (1949, Nirmal Chowdhury), Biplabi 
Khudiram (1951, Hiranmoy Sen) 
and Biyallish (1951, Hemen Gupta) 
revealed the latent anger that the 
filmmakers harboured and were wary 
of expressing earlier. Of these, Bhuli 
Nai was set against the 1905 partition 
of Bengal by Lord Curzon while 
Chattagram Astragar Lunthan was 
based on the failed raid of the colonial 
government’s Chittagong armoury in 
1930 by a group of young Bengalis 
under the leadership of a schoolteacher 
Surya Sen, affectionately remembered 
as ‘Master Da.’ Whereas, Biplabi 
Khudiram was based on one of 
Bengal’s most popular patriots, the 
teenage Khudiram Bose, who was 
hanged in connection with the Muzaffarpur bombing of 
30 April 1908. Biyallish on the other hand was set in 
1942 and garnering restlessness around the Quit India 
movement. Poignantly shot, the film depicted how an 
Indian police officer representing the brutally autocratic 
British Empire betrayed the nationalistic passion of 
fellow Indian freedom fighters. The film ends with India’s 
independence and an urge to identify the betrayers of the 
revolution. Bengal’s pioneer, the New Theatres studio, 
apart from a series of socially aware films that were on 
the verge of being termed political, made Pehla Aadmi in 
1950 directed by Bimal Roy. Shot in Hindi for the pan-
India audience, the film depicts the heroic exploits of 
Bengal’s very own Netaji Subhas Chandra Bose and his 
Indian National Army.
It is to be remembered that the celebratory ‘Freedom 
at Midnight’ might have bolstered filmmakers of Bombay 
and Madras but it meant less for those in Calcutta. There 
was a general belief that independence is traded in lieu 
of partition, that the earlier nationalist idealism was 
somewhat being vitiated. Incidentally and unfortunately, 
some of these films faced the wrath of the censor board 
of an independent nation fearing mass agitation against a 
nascent government, still trying to tread difficult waters. 
The tragedy of partition resurfaced in Nemai Ghosh’s 
Chhinnamul (1950) and later in the films of Ritwik Ghatak. 
Critically accepted much later, these films were generally 
not very successful commercially, probably because the 
audience’s wish was otherwise. The city of Calcutta was 
teeming with migrants, first from the villages during  
1942-43 and then in thousands post-partition from East 
Bengal. They carried the wounds of separation and the 
tragedies of trying to be part of a new and somewhat 
ruthless milieu. The mass psyche wanted a fresh look at 
identity and so was born the rural-urban couple in Uttam 
Kumar and Suchitra Sen. In parallel, a host of comedy 
films started becoming popular.     ?
Biyallish was set in 1942 and 
garnering restlessness around 
the Quit India movement. 
Poignantly shot, the film 
depicted how an Indian police 
officer representing the brutally 
autocratic British Empire 
betrayed the nationalistic 
passion of fellow Indian 
freedom fighters. The film 
ends with India’s independence 
and an urge to identify the 
betrayers of the revolution.
Page 5


YOJANA   August 2022 21
n ordinance was promulgated in 1876, 
empowering the British-run Bengal 
Government to ban performances of any play 
they found scandalous, defamatory, seditious, 
obscene, or otherwise prejudicial to the public interest. 
In no time, the Dramatic Performances Act, 1876 was 
imposed to check the revolutionary impulses of Bengali 
theatre. Playwrights who wished to attack the colonial 
rule soon turned to mythological plays to shield their 
nationalist messages to evade censor’s actions. With the 
heightening of the ‘Swadeshi’ movement at the turn of the 
19
th
 century, Bengali theatre tended to venerate the past 
more than any time before. It is in this context of fervent 
patriotic expression in the different art forms from the early 
days of the twentieth century that we need to review the 
role of Bengali cinema in reflecting the country’s freedom 
struggle.
In 1795, a Russian linguist and indologist, Gerasim 
Stepanovich Lebedev started proscenium drama in 
Calcutta, the then capital of British rule in India. These 
productions, translations of European plays in Bengali 
with native actors is arguably considered the pioneer of 
modern Indian theatre different from our traditional one, 
derived from Bharata Muni’s Natyashastra. During the 
middle of the 19
th
 century, the Bengali bard Madhusudan 
Dutt was involved with the theatre at Belgachia, which 
was a pioneer of modern, western-influenced theatre. Dutt 
Cinema as Vanguard of Nationalist Movement
Amitava Nag
The author is an independent film critic and one of the founding members of the film magazine, Silhouette and its current editor.
Email: amitava.nag@gmail.com
After implementing the Dramatic Performances Act in 1876, the British were quick to 
understand that cinema had a bigger potential to influence public opinion. Expectedly, India’s 
Cinematograph Act was passed in 1918 during the dying months of World War I, with effect 
from 1 August 1920. Based on the British Cinematograph Act 1909, the Indian version’s objective 
was nothing less than censoring the content of films to be exhibited for public consumption. 
With the advent of talkies, Bengali cinema drew its inspiration from the rich literary tradition viz. 
novels of Saratchandra Chatterjee, Bankim Chandra Chatterjee and occasionally, Rabindranath 
Tagore. The importance of content was observed since then, one of the reasons why in popular 
jargon, Bengalis even now refer to a film as a ‘boi’/‘book. ’
A
composed the play, Sharmistha, in the western style, in 
1858, based on the story of Debjani-Yayati of Mahabharata. 
It is considered the first original play was written in Bengali 
language. The following year, Dutt penned two farces: 
Ekei ki bole Sabhyata? and Buro Shaliker Ghare ro. While 
in the first, he satirises the addiction, disorderly conduct 
and immorality of the English-educated young Bengalis, 
in the second, he exposes the secret debauchery of the 
conservative and corrupt socialists of the conservative 
Hindu society. Although these socially aware plays were 
performed and appreciated, the first ‘Swadeshi’ play 
was Dinabandhu Mitra’s Nil Darpan that depicted the 
horrific tragedy of indigo farmers in rural Bengal and the 
resistance art 22 YOJANA   August 2022
British atrocities against them. The play written in 1859, 
portraying the contemporary indigo revolt, was staged a 
few years later in 1872 by Girish Chandra Ghosh. Ghosh 
established the National Theatre in the same year and the 
first performance of Bengali commercial-stage happened 
with Mitra’s controversial, yet poignant play.
Not far away, at the Tagores’, Rabindranath was 
exploring the ideas of spiritualism and individual identity, 
and in parallel raising questions on the collective vision 
of nationalism through Chitrangada (1892), Raja (1910), 
Dakghar (1913) and Raktakarabi (1924). Expectedly, Nil 
Darpan’s popularity go well with the British authorities 
who banned the performance of the play. The Dramatic 
Performances Act, 1876 was imposed to check the 
revolutionary impulses of Bengali theatre. The Act ensured 
that the flurry of nationalist plays after Nil Darpan which 
all rocketed to popularity, started to become rare. The 
police atrocities were rampant and the punishments severe. 
Interestingly, while the British came down heavily on the 
open ‘swadeshi’ theatre, they were somewhat indifferent to 
the mythological ones. 
With the heightening of the ‘Swadeshi’ movement at the 
turn of the 19
th
 century, Bengali theatre tended to venerate 
the past more than any time before. It 
was Lord Curzon’s implementation of 
the partition of Bengal in 1905 which 
served as fodder to strong nationalist 
sentiments amongst Bengalis. 
However, Curzon’s ‘divide and rule’ 
policy actually angered the Bengalis 
prior to 1905. In 1903, Kshirod Prasad 
Vidyavinod’s Pratapaditya reflected 
the latent wish of the race through 
Pratapaditya, a powerful zamindar of 
Bengal who raised his sword against 
the might of the Mughals to save Jessore (now 
in Bangladesh). Plays upholding religious unity 
alongside the strong wish of freedom from foreign 
forces seemed fervent. In the month of January, 1906 
itself, at the two leading theatres of Calcutta–– Star 
and Minerva, the following plays were staged and 
performed–– Kshirod Prasad Vidyavinod’s Padmini, 
Dwijendra Lal Roy’s Rana Pratap Singha, Amritalal 
Basu’s Shabash Bangali, Girish Ghosh’s Siraj-ud-
daula, and Haranath Bose’s Jagaran. The influence 
of Rajput heroes not only enriched the Bengali plays 
but also other literary forms notably by Dwijendra 
Lal Roy (whose song ‘Dhana Dhanye Pushpe Bhora’/ 
‘A land rich in grain and flowers’ from his play Shah 
Jahan remains to be one of the most popular patriotic 
songs till today). Incidentally, a year back, when 
Rana Pratap Singha was regularly been staged at the 
Star Theatre, mourning was observed on 6 September 
with no show or entertainment on that day.
In ‘Jatra’, the indigenous folk version of proscenium 
theatre without walls, the winds of patriotic vigour started 
flowing freely during that time. The most famous exponent 
of ‘Jatra’ was Charan Kabi Mukunda Das (original name 
Yajneshwar De). ‘Jatra’ had always drawn heavily from 
mythology. With Mukunda Das, there was a spread of 
political awareness that somehow complemented the 
problems in holding ‘Swadeshi’ meetings. The popularity 
of ‘Jatra’ amongst the masses ensured that Mukunda Das’s 
productions became big hits with the audience. Drawn 
between black and white representing evil against the 
good, these plays inescapably portrayed the British as the 
new form of evil in juxtaposition with Indian revolutionary 
symbolising the good. Born and brought up in what is now 
Bangladesh, Mukunda Das’s sweep was across the whole 
of undivided Bengal. His activities were soon termed as 
seditious and he was imprisoned particularly for a song– 
‘Chilo dhangolabhara, Shwet indurekorlo sara’, meaning 
‘The granary was full of paddy, The while mice ate it 
all.’ The ‘white mice’ refers to the British, obviously. 
Incidentally, long after the Swadeshi movement, Mukunda 
Das’s songs were popular even later during the Non-
Cooperation movements of the 1920s.
After implementing the Dramatic 
Performances Act in 1876, the British 
were quick to understand that cinema 
had a bigger potential to influence 
public opinion. Expectedly, India’s 
Cinematograph Act was passed in 
1918 during the dying months of 
World War I, with effect from 1 
August 1920. Based on the British 
Cinematograph Act 1909, the Indian 
version’s objective was nothing less 
than censoring the content of films to 
After implementing the 
Dramatic Performances Act in 
1876, the British were quick to 
understand that cinema had a 
bigger potential to influence 
public opinion. Expectedly, 
India’s Cinematograph Act  
was passed in 1918.
YOJANA   August 2022 23
be exhibited for public consumption. 
On top of it, this cinema from its birth 
has remained an expensive affair. It 
is in this context of fervent patriotic 
expression in the different art forms 
from the early days of the twentieth 
century that we need to review the 
role of Bengali cinema in reflecting 
the country’s freedom struggle. While 
the rest of India relied heavily on 
mythological and historical films even 
after talkies became the norm with 
Alam Ara in 1931, Bengali cinema already had socially 
relevant films starting with the silent Bilet Ferat in 
1921. However, unlike the other art forms which were 
familiar, cinema was new and dynamic. The migration 
from silent films to talkies, for example, was fraught with 
uncertainty and scepticism. An art form that is even now 
heavily dependent on the West, not only for the ever-
changing techniques but also for the raw materials no 
wonder intimidated the Indian filmmakers, including the 
Bengali ones of the time. The importance of cinema as 
a tool of propaganda was not envisioned by the British 
alone. In a Congress conference from 30 October till  
1 November 1939, at Calcutta, Netaji Subhas Chandra 
Bose advised the members from Faridpur district (now 
in Bangladesh) to form a film collective for the spread 
of cinema. Incidentally, the art magazine Rupamancha 
dedicated to film and theatre was one that started the 
same year. It was one of the earliest Bengali magazines 
that dealt with cinema.
With the advent of talkies, Bengali cinema drew its 
inspiration from the rich literary tradition viz. novels of 
Saratchandra Chatterjee, Bankim Chandra Chatterjee 
and occasionally, Rabindranath Tagore. The importance 
of content was observed since then, one of the reasons 
why in popular jargon, Bengalis even now refer a film 
as a ‘boi’/‘book.’ With the rise of Pramathesh Barua 
since the mid 1930s, the ascent 
of a star was introduced. Barua’s 
maudlin melodrama swept the elite 
Bengali audience although his films 
were also anchored in strong literary 
conventions. Since the turn of the 
new century, Bengal’s tragedy was 
manifold. The attempted partition 
of 1905 was followed by the shift of 
capital from Calcutta to Delhi in 1911. 
The manmade famine of 1942-43 was 
next in line and the severest at that time 
which shattered the Bengali confidence and emotional 
sanctity. Quite a few Bengali artists and filmmakers 
including Bimal Roy, Hrishikesh Mukherjee, and others 
started drifting away to a more stable and significantly 
more viable Bombay. The World War II that ended in 
1945 gifted dark despair to the whole India, including 
Bengal. Raw stock materials became expensive, black 
marketeers gained prominence. Studios including the 
most prestigious, the New Theatres, suffered losses and 
lost their enterprise. As per the data from Panna Shah’s 
1950 book, The Indian Film, between 1942 and 1945, the 
number of films in Bengali language reduced from 15 to 
9, almost becoming half. It is to be kept in mind that the 
film industry in Calcutta not only produced Bengali films 
but films in other languages as well. While films in Urdu 
and Tamil started drying up with the years, Hindi films 
were still being made. The War, the famine, the exodus 
from Calcutta to Bombay, all resulted in the industry 
becoming weaker by the day. The Bombay film industry 
had already established its monopoly of the pan-Indian 
market. In 1946, with a sudden buoyancy of raw money 
in the market, the Indian film industry experienced an 
unprecedented boom as Bombay produced 150 films 
(143 Hindi, 1 Gujarati, 2 Marathi, 2 Tamil, and 2 Telugu) 
vis-à-vis Calcutta’s meagre 23 (15 Bengali and 8 Hindi). 
The disparity widened in the next two years and apart 
from exceptions including Debaki 
Bose’s Chandrasekhar (1947), 
the Bengali film industry slowly 
moved into a strangulating cash 
crunch. It can be safely left for 
conjecture what could have been 
the future of the film industry had 
it not been the freedom of India 
that also meant the momentous 
partition of Bengal. The partition, 
apart from its psychological effect, 
impacted the very base of Bengali 
cinema’s home market.
Throughout the 1930s and 
1940s, Bengali cinema produced 
socially aware films which, as 
With the advent of talkies, 
Bengali cinema drew its 
inspiration from the rich 
literary tradition viz. novels 
of Saratchandra Chatterjee, 
Bankim Chandra Chatterjee  
and occasionally,  
Rabindranath Tagore. 
24 YOJANA   August 2022
explained above, seldom attacked 
British imperialism and oppression. 
In his seminal book Bengali Cinema 
(1991), Kiranmoy Raha explained the 
reason of absence— “In the thirties, 
the (revolutionaries) who gave their 
lives for their patriotic beliefs were 
loved and admired for their courage 
and sacrifice and became household 
names in Bengal. In 1942, the ‘Quit 
India’ Movement was launched. The 
nationalistic movement also acquired 
new social concepts which defined 
and gave utterance to the expectations 
of workers and peasants. But Bengali 
cinema of the period did not seem to 
notice any of these things. For socially 
conscious and politicised people, like Bengalis who had 
been in the vanguard of social, artistic, and political 
movements in India, this was surprising. Apprehension 
about films being banned under the censorship rules was 
no doubt a serious and weighty reason. But there is no 
reliable record of serious attempts having been made to 
make films which could circumvent the rules and yet get 
the message across.” In Cinema and the Indian Freedom 
Struggle (1998), Gautam Kaul went a step further and 
analysed – “The very limited response of Bengali cinema 
to the freedom theme must have other factors too…I 
attribute it to the disposition of those financers of Bengali 
films who preferred gambling their wealth more freely in 
races at Calcutta’s Royal Turf Club than in films on the 
freedom themes. Their business was sustained by contracts 
and dealings with British administration and could not 
afford to bite the hand that fed them their daily bread. 
Again, perhaps Bengali nationalism preferred to focus on 
the modernisation of society and religious reforms as a 
prelude to political self-assertion, a tradition which also 
found itself in other vernacular cinemas prominently.” 
Yet, there were a few attempts within the predominant 
silence to make patriotic films. Sushil Mazumdar was 
one director to notice who made films on contemporary 
politics mixed with social issues viz. Muktisnan (1937), 
Pratishodh (1941) and later after independence, Soldier’s 
Dream (1948), Sarbahara (1948) and Dukhir Iman (1954) 
to name some. Apart from these, Ardhendu Mukherjee 
made Sangram (1946), Sudhirbandhu Bannerjee directed 
Bande Mataram (1946) while Satish Dasgupta brought 
on celluloid Sarat Chandra Chatterjee’s Pather Dabi with 
the same name in 1947, five months before 15 August.
Understandably, it was just after the independence that 
several films were made that demonstrated the hardships 
of a captive nation. Films such as Bhuli Nai (1948, Hemen 
Gupta), Joyjatra (1948, Niren Lahiri), Chattagram 
Astraghar Lunthan (1949, Nirmal Chowdhury), Biplabi 
Khudiram (1951, Hiranmoy Sen) 
and Biyallish (1951, Hemen Gupta) 
revealed the latent anger that the 
filmmakers harboured and were wary 
of expressing earlier. Of these, Bhuli 
Nai was set against the 1905 partition 
of Bengal by Lord Curzon while 
Chattagram Astragar Lunthan was 
based on the failed raid of the colonial 
government’s Chittagong armoury in 
1930 by a group of young Bengalis 
under the leadership of a schoolteacher 
Surya Sen, affectionately remembered 
as ‘Master Da.’ Whereas, Biplabi 
Khudiram was based on one of 
Bengal’s most popular patriots, the 
teenage Khudiram Bose, who was 
hanged in connection with the Muzaffarpur bombing of 
30 April 1908. Biyallish on the other hand was set in 
1942 and garnering restlessness around the Quit India 
movement. Poignantly shot, the film depicted how an 
Indian police officer representing the brutally autocratic 
British Empire betrayed the nationalistic passion of 
fellow Indian freedom fighters. The film ends with India’s 
independence and an urge to identify the betrayers of the 
revolution. Bengal’s pioneer, the New Theatres studio, 
apart from a series of socially aware films that were on 
the verge of being termed political, made Pehla Aadmi in 
1950 directed by Bimal Roy. Shot in Hindi for the pan-
India audience, the film depicts the heroic exploits of 
Bengal’s very own Netaji Subhas Chandra Bose and his 
Indian National Army.
It is to be remembered that the celebratory ‘Freedom 
at Midnight’ might have bolstered filmmakers of Bombay 
and Madras but it meant less for those in Calcutta. There 
was a general belief that independence is traded in lieu 
of partition, that the earlier nationalist idealism was 
somewhat being vitiated. Incidentally and unfortunately, 
some of these films faced the wrath of the censor board 
of an independent nation fearing mass agitation against a 
nascent government, still trying to tread difficult waters. 
The tragedy of partition resurfaced in Nemai Ghosh’s 
Chhinnamul (1950) and later in the films of Ritwik Ghatak. 
Critically accepted much later, these films were generally 
not very successful commercially, probably because the 
audience’s wish was otherwise. The city of Calcutta was 
teeming with migrants, first from the villages during  
1942-43 and then in thousands post-partition from East 
Bengal. They carried the wounds of separation and the 
tragedies of trying to be part of a new and somewhat 
ruthless milieu. The mass psyche wanted a fresh look at 
identity and so was born the rural-urban couple in Uttam 
Kumar and Suchitra Sen. In parallel, a host of comedy 
films started becoming popular.     ?
Biyallish was set in 1942 and 
garnering restlessness around 
the Quit India movement. 
Poignantly shot, the film 
depicted how an Indian police 
officer representing the brutally 
autocratic British Empire 
betrayed the nationalistic 
passion of fellow Indian 
freedom fighters. The film 
ends with India’s independence 
and an urge to identify the 
betrayers of the revolution.
YOJANA   August 2022 27
ven before 1857, the tribal people had 
revolted against the British in India time 
and again. The British had to struggle to 
establish their authority in the tribal areas. 
References to such revolts are not easily available. 
Although the contribution of tribals was significant in 
the freedom movement that took place before and after 
1857 across the country, the movements that took place 
especially in present-day Chhattisgarh in central India 
are touched upon here.
Tribal Uprisings before 1857
After winning the Battle of Plassey in 1757 and 
acquiring the Diwani of Bengal, Bihar, and Orissa in 
1765, the East India Company began efforts to annex 
Chhattisgarh. Most of the central part of Chhattisgarh 
was under the control of the Maratha rulers of Nagpur, 
and the rest of the area was ruled by different Princely 
States. The British got their first success in 1800, when 
the Raja of Raigad signed a treaty with the Company 
and made Raigad a part of the Government. They 
annexed the Maratha empire after its defeat in the 
war at Nagpur in 1818, and began to rule the central 
region of Chhattisgarh. However, in Bastar, the south 
of Chhattisgarh and Surguja in the north, several tribal 
rebellions arose to save tribal people from the slavery of 
the Company’s Government.
The Halba rebellion against the British (1774-1779) 
was marked by bloodshed and daring attacks. To 
capture Bastar, the British, with the help of the King of 
Jeypore and the younger brother of the King of Bastar, 
Dariyavdev Singh, formed a joint army and attacked 
Freedom Movement in Central India
Dr Sushil Trivedi
Indian Independence movement was a people’s movement that gained strength as it progressed. 
This transcended regional and class differences and became an expression of the collective 
resolve of the people of the entire country. Generally, the history of the freedom movement 
is described from the defining moments of the first freedom struggle of 1857. The noticeable 
feature of our historiography is the repeated mention of some regions and classes in the freedom 
movement, but the contribution of tribal areas and its people is often ignored.
earL y triBaL uPrising E
The author is a retired IAS and former State Election Commissioner. Email: drsushil.trivedi@gmail.com
Ajmer Singh, King of Bastar in 1774. Ajmer Singh’s 
army of Halba tribesmen conclusively defeated the 
British army. This war lasted until 1779, but the British 
were not successful. Later, Dariyavdev Singh killed 
Ajmer Singh by deceit. In this genocide, an attempt was 
made to wipe out the entire tribe. It can be said that this