Chapter 2 Bombay Talkies Ltd. and Indo-German Collaboration 2.1

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Chapter 2

Bombay Talkies Ltd. and Indo-German collaboration

2.1. From the early attempts at production to Bombay Talkies

Apart from Himansu Rai, Devika Rani, Niranjan Pal, Franz Osten and other German and Indian technicians there were some other people who were important for the formation of Bombay Talkies Ltd. This well equipped studio was formed in 1934 as a joint stock company having F.E. Dinshaw, Sir Chimanlal Setalvad, Sir Chunilal Mehta, Sir Pheroze Sethna and Sir Cowasji Jehangir as some of its partners. Rai Saheb Chunilal joined hands with Himansu Rai once again for Bombay Talkies after founding Himansu Rai Indo-International Talkies, Ltd., in 1931. Rai Saheb Chunilal was quite an influential man having worked as Financial Assistant and Accounts Officer to the Inspector General of Police and Assistant Commandant of Police. He was also the secretary, vice-president and later President of Indian Association in Iraq. He operated as the Vice-President of the Motion Picture Society of India from 1934 to 1936. He chiefly operated as the General Manager and Controller of Distribution Department for Bombay Talkies Ltd. (ICYB 1938 40). The Bombay Talkies studio was supposed to be built in Chembur as Rai wished for but F.E. Dinshaw’s idle lying bunglow at Malad was offered as a space by Mr. Dinshaw, one of the Board members of the studio, himself. Bombay Talkies was started “…as a joint stock company with an authorized capital of Rupees 2.5 million. On its board were the city’s distinguished industrialists, lawyers etc. One of its directors, Sir Richard Temple was, however, the main drive behind the newly formed company” (Gangar 3). Niranjan Pal in his autobiography Such is Life considers Sir Richard Temple’s contribution to the formation of Bombay Talkies Ltd. very important. Pal writes:

Himansu is recognised as the founder of Bombay Talkies though the credit is really due to Sir Richard Temple…He had joined Himansu’s Indo International Talkies capital. He lived in a suit provided for him by Himansu at the studio and was always at hand whenever any trouble brewed. It was his considerable presence that guided the company through the teething years. He was amply supported by Sir Chimanlal Setalvad, who harboured a soft corner for Himansu, the latter having once given him up his lower berth in a First Class coupe while travelling from Lahore to Bombay…(236).

Considered to be one of the best studios in the early talkie era of Indian cinema the story of collaboration of the important participants in formation of Bomabay Talkies studio goes back in 1920s.

Himansu Rai and Niranjan Pal met in London. Niranjan Pal, accompanied his father Bipin Chandra Pal, to London where he was supposed to study medicine. But Niranjan Pal’s nationalistic ideas got better off him as he made friends with Vinayak Damodar Savarkar, an extremist for Britishers. It was Savarkar who introduced Pal to the world of theatre in London at West End stage. Joyojit Pal in his article “Niranjan Pal and Orientalism in Early Indian Cinema” states “…Pal and other Indian youngsters would frequently go to the theatre and start to think about how theatre represented the ‘natives’” (5). Pal had a flair for writing and some of his plays were performed in London. Pal’s play The Goddess (1922) was to be performed in London with all Indian caste and at this juncture he met Himansu Rai. Himansu Rai had finished his studies in law from Middle Temple and wanted to pursue his interest in theatre. Rai, being a part of The Indian Players, a troop of young Indian actors, ended up collaborating with Pal. The play was a success. Himansu Rai and Niranjan Pal’s collaboration continued when they started working on the idea of making films.

Kusum Pant Joshi and Lalit Mohan Joshi in their co-written article “Cultural Nationalsim in the Age of Empire: The Light of Asia (1925)” state “For Pal, writing for the silver screen was primarily a reaction against ‘Orientalism’ or the highly exaggerated or negative, degrading and humiliating manner in which non-western cultures were generally portrayed in the west” (36). Niranjan Pal had already been working on a script based on the life of Gautam Buddha. His script was based on Sir Edwin Arnold’s narrative poem The Light of Asia (1897) that explores the life of Gautam Buddha. Niranjan Pal ended up writing the script as a reaction to Frank Wilson’s film Indian Woman’s Pluck. Pal’s disagreement with the director through a conversation “…ended with him being told to write his own scripts if he felt westerners were unable to accurately depict India” (Joshi and Joshi 7). Pal’s search of producers who would make a film out of his script continued till Charles Urban the producer from Natural Colour Kinematograph Company agreed to use Pal’s script. But the the film did not materialise as Natural Colour Kinematograph went out of business (Joshi and Joshi 150). However later around 1923 Himansu Rai’s trip to India to see the possibilities of staging The Goddess was fruitful. Nirnajan Pal recalls:

The idea of staging The Goddess in India had not found any financial backers and Himansu turned his attention to films. He cleverly utilised the publicity I had received in the Statesman… Himansu had met Sir Moti Sagar, an eminent ex-judge of the Lahore High Court, and got him to agree to finance Light of Asia. Himansu was carrying on him a Letter of Credit on Lloyds Bank for 50,000 rupees and all that was needed to produce this film was to get Emelka’s technical backing. (Joshi and Joshi 201)

Rai and Pal left for Munich where they struck the deal with Emelka, the German company. The Indo-German collaboration was confirmed as Emelka agreed to send a technical crew and equipments to shoot the film. Peter Ostermayr who was at the helm of Emelka gave the responsibility of direction to his younger brother Franz Osermayr known as Franz Osten.

Franz Osten was accompanied by two cameramen Josef Wirsching and Josef Kiermeier along with an interpreter Bertl Schultes. Bertl Schultes in his memoir A Comedian Looks Back describes his experience in following way:

On the 18th March (1925) towards noon, we disembarked in Bombay. Passport and customs formalities were quickly concluded. Then we went by car to our first Indian hotel, the ‘Taj Mahal’.

Our task was the production of the great international film ‘The Light of Asia’. It portrays the life and the struggle of Gautama Buddha. Himansu Rai played the title role. Whilst still aboard ship I had already studied the script intensively and knew the whole plot almost by heart. It was a splendid task for us four ‘Munichwallahs’. (qtd. in Koch 31)

After the German technicians arrived in India Himansu Rai started hunting for the actors to play the characters. While Sharada Ukil was selected for the role of Gautam Buddha’s father, Rai could not find anybody to play the character of Gopa, Gautama’s wife. Even after advertising in the Calcutta newspapers nobody turned up. Pal recalls “We did not realise that in those days, no respectable woman would dare be seen inside a film studio, much less appear on the screen. Osten kept insisting we fall back on German girl” (Joshi and Joshi 206-07). Nevertheless Rai, Pal and Osten selected Renee Smith, an Anglo-Indian girl, who had approached them after reading the

advertisement in newspaper. Renee Smith later came to be known as Seeta Devi, her screen name, and worked with Madan Theatres. Himansu played the character of Buddha. The actual shoot of the film was made easy by Sri Alexander Muddiman’s recommendation, who was a Home minister in Lord Reading’s Government (Jsohi and Joshi 208). Maharaja of Jaipur supported with access to his property and whatever he could avail them. Gehrard Koch, in his book Franz Osten’s Indian Silent Film published in (1983), translates and quotes Osten’s report on his experience of working on Light of Asia. Osten’s report appears in the German film journal Lichtbild-Bühne No. 129 published in 1925. Osten states:

One of the richest Maharajas showed a great interest in our work. He offered us all possible help and support, and for some of the crowd scenes he offered not only his people dressed in precious old costumes, but also about 30 elephants. These animals, which are sacred to the Indians, wore trappings made of gold and precious stones. Each such dress of the elephants was worth 450,000 Goldmarks. (qtd. in Koch 30)

The process of shooting and developing the film was not easy. Osten recalls that they had to shoot in 40 to 50 degree centigrades in the mid of the month of June. The crew suffered from heat strokes. They had to use police force for the crowd control. Osten also mentions that the entire film was shot without studio with natural light. Some of the scenes were shot in naturally well-lit interiors and none of the actors used make- up. One of the most tedious tasks for Osten was the developing of negatives. Osten mentions “Because of a lack of pure well-water, the water had to be filtered. But despite filtering the water five times through cotton wad filters, the water remained cloudy and caused bubbles on the film” (30). The shooting of the film was completed within a month. The film was screened in Germany first and in Britain later. Light of Asia was premiered at the Kammerlichtspiele in Munich on 22nd October 1925. Reviews of the film from the German film journals and news papers credit the success of the film to Franz Osten. Apart from praising Osten’ efforts some of the comments on the film point out flaws in the film (Koch 31-36). Deutsche Filmwoche No.29 published in 1925, for example, states:

Franz Osten wanted to fetch ‘the light’ from the East, but the little he found flickers too much.

This film is too long by half, and the other half is also not as fine as it might have been. Yet one cannot blame Osten and his assistants because they had to work in India where it went as well as it could considering theat ehy had to face hundreds of difficulties which deserves our full respect. The cardinal error is in the script. All the first six acts constitute exposition and are the introduction to a film which could begin with the seventh act. It must be said that in our INRI-film and in the American film ‘The Ten Commandments’ there was more religion than here. (qtd. in Koch 27)

The marketing of the film was not that easy particularly for Rai and Pal. The initial contract with the Emelka mentioned Emelka to have twenty percent share of the profits. But misunderstanding between the Managing Director of the Great Eastern Corporation and Rai lead to the new contract to be signed between Emelka nad Great Eastern Corporation. In the new contract, Emelka got sixty percent share for the worldwide distribution rights and Great Eastern Corporation would receive forty percent profit. Pal mentions in his autobiography:

Before Pandit Sharma agreed to the ridiculous offer, Emelka came up with another offer of £20,000 to buy out the negatives’ rights of Light of Asia. Pandit Sharma laughed at the offer as he had been told by friends that the film would bring in a minimum of £250,000. The Great Eastern Corporation had not invested anything more than a lakh of rupees and Emelka’s offer would have yielded 200 percent profit….Himansu and I did not receive a penny as working partners…(Joshi and Joshi 210-211)

In London the film ran for ten months continuously. There was a special show arranged for King George V at Windsor Castle. Pal recollects that he and Rai were received by Queen Mary and congratulated them expressing the only regret “…that Light of Asia had not been produced in colour” (Joshi and Joshi 213). The story of Gautam Buddha, elements of religion and spirituality were well received both in Germany and Britain. The film was screened in most of the major countries. The next venture of Rai, Pal and Osten was Shiraz.

Shiraz was produced in 1928. This time Himansu Rai and Niranjan Pal collaborated with British Instructional Films Ltd. of UK and Ufa from Germany. For this film the cameramen were H. Harris and E. Schunemann. Franz Osten continued

as the director. Based on the stories revolving around the Taj Mahal the film depicts Shiraz’s love for Selima who is called Mumtaz later. The film was considered a masterpiece for the shots of the crowd, depth of field shots and the overall grandeur captured through camera. Shiraz was well received in India as well. Koch quotes review of Shiraz that appeared in The Illustrated Weekly of India on 24th February 1929.

Calcutta cinema-fans have lately been afforded the opportunity to see ‘Shiraz’ and the general verdict is: ‘Excellent!’, a hope generally being added that the producers and artistes will maintain their co-operation and present the world, in due course, with more pictures of the same quality. Here is a sphere, one cannot help reflecting, which opens the whole world to Indian talent, for I take it that no country desires to exclude or obstruct the entry of a screen- masterpiece of this character if only it is so ‘racy of the soil’ that it could not be produced outside this country. And so it will be with future productions of the same genesis and atmosphere. Utilising this medium, India is placed in a position to convey an accurate conception of its traditions and culture to every country in the world. (qtd. in Koch 43)

Himansu Rai played the titular hero Shiraz, Charu Roy played the character of Prince Khurram who becomes the King Shah Jahan later. Enaksshi Rama Rau played the character of Selima who later becomes Queen Mumtaz Mahal.

The third film of Indo-British-German collaboration was A Throw of Dice. A Throw of Dice, produced in 1929 was based on an episode of Mahabharat. Sohat played by Himansu Rai and Ranjit played by Charu Roy are two neighbouring kings who like to play the game of dice. King Sohat a treacherous king wants King Sohat’s kingdom. While on tiger hunt King Ranjit tries to kill King Sohat. However injured Sohat is treated by a hermit. Sohat falls in love with hermit’s daughter. The film gets more complicated as it progresses. Ultimately King Sohat gets back Sunita his wife and his kingdom. King Ranjit kills himself by jumping off a cliff. Like earlier two films Throw of Dice too was a success. The German film magazine Film-Kurier No. 181, published in 1929 states “One easily believes Franz Osten when he describes the amount of energy necessary to produce a good film in a country like India which his so uninterested in technical achievements….It is pretty difficult to find extras,

especially when one requires them in such large number as Franz Osten does for his final scenes” (qtd. In Koch 48). The shots of crowd at the end of the film are also praised in the reviews. Shiraz and Throw of Dice were edited at Ufa studio in Germany. Devika Rani joined Rai at Ufa studio when Throw of Dice was being edited. Devika Rani was a trainee in the Eric Pommer unit. Rani worked with German artists like Fritz Lang, Emil Jannings, Sternberg. Devika Rani recalls “Deitrich was there too, and I knew her very well. My particular guru was Pabst and I studied acting under Max Reinhardt. Most important of all it was a period of transition from silent to sound films” (qtd. In Koch 4). Devika Rani was a grand niece of Dr. Rabindra Nath Tagore. She studied at Madras and Shantiniketen. At the age of nine Devika Rani went to England and studied at South Hampstead School. Devika Rani earned scholarships for Royal Academy of Music and Royal Academy of Dramatic Art. She later got interested in architecture and studied Applied Arts. She specialised in Textile Designing and Decor which came handy when she worked as textile designer for a leading art studio in London and later as a costume designer at Ufa for Himansu Rai (Baghdadi and Rao 4).

The three silent films, good examples of international collaboration, were successful. Rai and Devika Rani had to come back to India after the Ufa studio was reorganised due to the introduction of sound in cinema. Amrit Gangar in his book Franz Osten and the Bombay Talkies: A Journey from Munich to Malad states that Himansu Rai and Devika Rani’s German career ended as Hitler became powerful in Germany and the Indo-German co-productions never seemed possible (2).

Himansu Rai upon his return to India formed Himansurai Indo-International Talkies Ltd. in Bombay. Sir Chimanlal Setalvad was its chairman. Under this company Himansu Rai produced Karma aka Nagan Ki Ragini in 1933. Karma was the first Indian film to be made in English.

Karma was instrumental in establishing Devika Rani’s image as an actress. Varieties Weekly a weekly film journal in its March 1934 Vol. IV Issue No. 22 has an entire article devoted to the film. After being screened all over Europe, Karma was screened in India. The article states:

This is ‘Karma’ which was first released in London nine months ago. Devika Rani, the Indian star, and her husband Mr. Himansu Rai, the producer of the

film, both of whom play the romantic roles, were congratulated by Sir Samuel Hoare, the Secretary of State for India, Lady Hoare, two Ex-Viceroys in Lord Irwin and Lord Reading and other distinguished personages whose presence added a rare distinction to the most brilliant gathering that was ever seen at a London cinema house. (Editor 10)

The editor of the journal gives details of how British press had praised Devika Rani’s histrionic abilities to act on the screen. The editor observes:

The Daily Herald (London) hailed her as the ‘Screen’s most beautiful star,’ while the Morning Post described her as ‘one of the greatest stars that the talkies have yet produced.’ The London Pictorial observed: ‘She will set the whole world talking’… The News Chronicle observed: ‘She will dazzle all London…She Totally eclipses the ordinary film-star. All her gestures speak. She is grace personified.’(11)

This article is full of praises for Devika Rani. It also suggests that Karma was a huge success in India. Himansu Rai and Devika Rani’s accuracy of English pronunciation is also emphasized along with the modern theme of the film.

Karma was directed by J. L. Freer Hunt and E. Schunemann was the cameraman. The story and script of the film was written by Diwan Sharar. According to Indranil Bhattacharya “There was a major hype surrounding the film. The publicity brochures described the theme of the film as ‘a struggle between modern progress and age-old conservatism’” (Visions of Splendour 13-14). The film depicts a progressive maharani played by Devika Rani who falls in love with a prince of neighbouring state. Her modern ideas of banishing the practice of hunting come in conflict with her would be father-in-law. In the film there are specific conversations that directly refer to the words ‘modern’, ‘modernity’ and ‘tradition’. This film can be considered as a precursor to what Himansu Rai, Devika Rani, Niranjan Pal and Franz Osten were going to present to the Indian audience with the formation of Bombay Talkies.

As Bombay Talkies Ltd., got formed, Rai made sure that the studio is at par with the international studios. Bombay Talkies Ltd. was equipped with Derbie Super Parvo and Cameraclair Radio for picture recording. Visatone and Cameraclair were used for sound recording. The film processing plant established was automatic. While

most of the other studios in India used U.S made cameras and recording machines. Bombay Talkies used Britain made Visatone machine. Rafique Baghdadi and Rajiv Rao in “The Romance of Bombay Talkies,” published in Screen, September 28, 1984 issue on Bombay Talkies, describe the studio as:

A sound and echo proof stage was built along with dressing rooms, laboratory workshops, offices, a restaurant and a theatre. Rai bought the best equipment available-several modern cameras, the latest sound recording apparatus, a triple set of automatic film developing and printing machines, editing tables, several batteries of high powered arcs and the only set in India of the newly invented playback apparatus. (4)

With the production house and studio ready, Bombay Talkies produced its first talkie Jawani Ki Hawa (1935). Jawani Ki Hawa dealt with the issue of love marriage using the format of crime thriller. Kamala (Devika Rani) elopes with her childhood friend Ratanlal (Najmul Hussain) to avoid unwanted marriage. Kamala’s father follows them and while having heated debate with Ratanlal a murder takes place. Nobody knows who has committed the crime. There are multiple characters confessing to the murder. Most of the film is shot inside the train. The train, inform Baghdadi and Rao, “was hired from the GiP Railway” (4). V. P Sathe in the same issue in his article “Simple, Wholesome Entertainment: Hallmark of Bombay Talkies Films,” explains:

Though ‘Jawani ki Hawa’ is not the ideal example of the new trend ushered in by Bombay Talkies. It did succeed in creating an air of freshness and simplicity that later became the hallmarks of Bombay Talkies productions. The freshness was evident in the selection of only newcomers and in the setting of a railway train and outdoor shooting. The simplicity was evident in the dialogue, songs and acting which till then was dominated by the theatrical style. Before Bombay Talkies arrived on the scene, the dialogue of Hindi films was written by either Hindi pundits or Urdu munshis. So the dialogue was either in high flown Urdu or Hindi. The simple Hindustani language of the Hindi film was evolved by Bombay Talkies. J. S. Kashyap was neither a munshi nor a pundit of the old school. He wrote dialogue and songs in a language which Bengalee Himansu Rai and Bengalee Niranjan Pal could understand. Naturally the high flown dialogue had no place in pictures like

Jawani ki Hawa. As a result there were no melodramatic theatrical exchanges of dialogue in Bombay Talkies films. (6)

One of the important factors in the success of Bombay Talkies films was its music. Himansu Rai had appointed a Parsee girl Khorsheed Manchershah Minocher-Homji aka Saraswati Devi as a music director for Bombay Talkies studio. She was a “…disciple of Pt. Vishnu Narain Bhatkhande. She studied Indian classical music at the Lord Morris College Lucknow (Shah 10). Saraswati Devi’s sister Manek appeared on screen in Jawani ki Hawa. The Parsi community was not very happy with the two sisters’ involvement with the film world. Shah in his article “Musical Odyssey of Bombay Talkies,” mentions that the Parasi Panchayat Board “…brought pressure on the two Parsi members of the Bombay Talkies Board who resigned in protest when Himansu Rai did not relent” (Shah 4). Saraswati Devi’s music was popular among the audience. Her compositions were based on Indian classical Ragas. She sparingly used instruments. Shah mentions “The orchestra comprised mainly of tabla, sarangi and sitar. Jal Tarang was her favourite instrument and she made a generous use of it” (10). Shah also mentions that the playback system was already there with the studio but Himansu Rai had made the actors sing their own songs.

Ashok Kumar Ganguly was a son of a lawyer and deputy magistrate. He grew up in Khandwa, studied law in Calcutta and moved on to join Bombay Talkies as a laboratory assistant. It was after Jawani Ki Hawa that he was roped in as a lead actor opposite Devika Rani. The reason for Ashok Kumar to be almost dragged into acting comes out as a result of a scandalous event. Najmul Husain and Devika Rani had left Bombay Talkies trying to get into New Theatres. Himansu Rai was devasted upon knowing this. Niranjan Pal in his autobiography and Sadat Hasan Manto in his writing on Ashok Kumar describe Najmul Husain and Devika Rani’s affair and the incident of their leaving Bombay Talkies. However, Pal describes:

With Devika back, Himansu planned for Jeevan Naiya to go ahead with another leading man. He would not consider any of the artistes then flourishing with other film companies in Bombay and suggested he would pull Ashok Kumar Ganguly out from the laboratory. Ashok had been doing exceedingly well and would have been placed in charge of the laboratory when the German Zolle left. He had no interest in an unchartered career for

which he neither had a liking nor aptitude. Blessed with handsome looks he had the personality to be a hero except that he could not act for nuts. (Joshi and Joshi 239)

Ashok Kumar’s first film opposite Devika Rani was Jeevan Naiyya (1936). He did not earn the popularity that Devika Rani had at the early stage of his career. But later on became very famous for his acting skills (Manto 114).

Bombay Talkies studio formed in 1934 produced its last film Baadbaan in 1954. The history of Bombay Talkies can be divided into two periods. The first would be from the beginning in 1934 to 1940. In 1939 the World War 2 broke and the German technicians were “… interned at Deolali….Other Germans were interned for the whole duration of the war but Osten was released and repatriated to Germany because of his old age and ill health” (Gangar 4). Himansu Rai had a nervous breakdown in the early 1940 and passed away on May 19th. Niranjan Pal had already left Bombay Talkies by 1938 over some differences with Himansu Rai. The reason Pal gives in his autobiography to leave Bombay Talkies is:

…the tension persisting between Himansu and me came to a head. I had written an article in a film journal criticising film producers in general, and Himansu took this as a personal affront. He told me I could not write articles as long as I was on a company payroll. I said I had not mortgaged my pen to him and cherished my freedom to write as I pleased, except that I would not sell my stories to another producer. I scribbled my resignation and handed it to him, came out of the office to drive away, chased by a ranting Himansu. He screamed that he would not let me go, and tore my resignation to bits. As I started up the car, he almost wrenched the steering wheel off. I drove out of the studio, never again to enter it in Himansu’s lifetime. (Joshi and Joshi 240- 41)

With Niranjan Pal gone from the studio in 1937 its films lost the reform element in them. Thus by the year 1940 Bombay Talkies studio’s three important contributors were no more with the company. After Rai’s death the second phase of Bombay Talkies starts. After Himansu Rai it was Devika Rani who took over the reins of administration of the studio. But soon the production house was divided into two groups. Sasadhar Mukherjee and Amiya Chakravarti were appointed as two separate

producers. Both of them had assisted Himansu Rai in the production work. But Sasadhar Mukherjee left Bombay Talkies to form his own studio Filmistan. By 1954 Bombay Talkies Ltd. was liquidated. It was sold to Filmistan’s owner (Chitnis The glory… 14).

Leela Chitnis’ association with Bombay Talkies started with the successful film Kangan (1939). In her autobiography Chanderi Duniyet she mentions the way Bombay Talkies studio operated in the 1930s. She describes Bombay Talkies as a complete studio. While describing the daily shooting in the studio Chitnis states:

Story, screenplay, dialogues everything used to be ready before the shooting used to begin. The process was similar to the studios in Western countries….Himansu Rai’s aimed at projecting film making as a respectable business. He always employed educated young men and women to achieve the respectablility to film business. (my translation Chanderi Duniyet154-55)

Chitnis considers Bombay Talkies as a disciplined studio. Himansu Rai’s involvement in the process film making is described in details by Chitnis. She remembers:

In the film industry film direction and production were considered to be two altogether different fields. Their responsibilities are completely different from each other and generally do not meddle with each other. But I was surprised to see the way Himansu Rai and Franz Osten worked together. Himansu Rai would be called before taking any important shot. The actors were made to reherse infront of Himansu Rai. Once he was satisfied Franz Osten would do the final take. (my tanslaiton Chander Duniyet 152)

H. V. Desai, known for his comic role in Bhabhi (1938) and subsequent films he was involved in with Bombay Talkies. H. V. Desai was a Lawyer by profession but was interested in acting. Bombay Talkeis provided him the opportunity with Bhabhi. The way Desai used to carry himself on the sets of the films was comic. His expressions and body language would create humour (Chitnis 158). He would generally get nervous while shooting and many retakes would happen as he would forget the dialogues. Chitnis recalls:

Whenever he would face the camera, he used to forget the dialogues or the body movements. There would be at least 10-12 retakes because of

Desai….Osten was a man of temper. He would easily get angry at the mistakes of people involved in the shooting. Desai would commit mistakes and Osten would get angry with him. Desai as a result Desai would feel more nervous and commit more mistakes and Osten would get angrier. It was a vicious cycle…’cut cut cut’ screamed Osten Saheb…and said, ‘Najam, go tell Mr. Rai I give up, I cannot get an o.k. shot from Desai. It is as impossible as catching a flying butter-fly.’ (my translation 159-60)

It is through these kinds of personal documents that the operations of Bombay Talkies come forth. Chitnis considers Bombay Talkeis a better studio than Prabhat.

Hansa Wadkar in her short autobiography Sangtye Aika describes Bombay Talkies as a disciplined studio. Wadkar states:

The discipline in Bombay Talkies was good. We used to get the dialogues and shot discriptions before the shooting would commence. We would exactly know the movements and what is to be done beforehand….There was Franz Osten and other German technicians in Bombay Talkies. They would not understand Hindi or Marathi. Still they would do their work properly. They would have English translation of our dialougues. This director, Franz Osten, had a peculiar style of directing. Once the camera started rolling he would shut his eyes and open them only after the shot is complete. Once I asked him about his method and he replied, ‘Cinematography is the cameraman’s work. I get to know your work by the way you deliver your dialogues. (my translation 16-17)

Bombay Talkies gave opportunities and trained many young men and women. While describing the Bombay Talkies studio as a training centre for new entrants in film industry, B. D. Garga states that the German technicians:

…were brought tout to India on the clear understanding that they would train Indian technicians. Which they did, training a large number of bright young graduates drawn from all over the country, among them Sashadhar Mukherjee, Savak Vacha, R.D. Pareenja, R.D. Mathur, Amiya Chakrabarty, J. K. Nanda, R.C. Talwar, N.R. Acharya, Najam Naqvi, K.A. Abbas, J.S. Cashyup, Ashok Kumar Ganguly, to name just a few among technicians and directors. Even in

acting, headed by Devika Rani, who had studied at London’s famous RADA and laer took lessons with Max Reinhardt, the studio groomed newcomers like Kishore Sahu, Ashok Kumar, Najaul Hussain, Jairaj, Renuka Devi, Leela Chitnis, Snehprabha Pradhan, Dilip Kumar and Raj Kapoor, in a relaxed, natural style. (Himansu Rai From Munich To Malad 95)

Bombay Talkies’s contribution to the Indian film industry goes long way considering the artists trained in Bombay Talkies were involved in some interesting and important films produced in the 1940s and 1950s.

Osten directed 15 films for Bomaby Talkies. These films were of varied genres. Achhut Kanya (1936), Janmabhoomi (1936), Jeevan Naiya (1936), Jeevan Prabhat (1937), Durga (1939) and Kangan (1939) can be considered as socials. Navjeevan (1939) and Miya Biwi (1937) are comedies. Izzat (1936) and Vachan (1938) are period drama. Savitri (1937) is a mythological. Nirmala (1938) deals with the protagonist’s obsession with motherhood and can be looked at as a psychological drama. Bhabi (1938) was an adaptation of Saradindu Banerjee written novel Bisher Dhuan ponders on the narrow minded society. Prem Kahani (1937) is a love story with story within story format. Mamata (1936) is a courtroom drama in which a dancing girl has to undergo a trial for murdering her former lover to save her child.

Bombay Talkies experimented with variety of genres from crime thriller, period drama, psychological drama, mythology to social drama. Technically too the films were regarded with high esteem. Sathe states:

Technically Bombay Talkies films were always of high standard. The finest available equipment was expertly used by German technicians. Just as in dialogue this Bombay Talkies film avoided theatrical high flown exchanges, similarly in visual presentation the film avoided any flashy camera angles or movements. The camera was not static. It trucked forwards or backwards or even sideways as the scene demanded. But the camera never tilted or zoomed or rushed at high speed to give any special dramatic effect. This straight, simple, but effective manner of narration distinguished the Bombay Talkies films. (6)

The technical analysis of the selected films appear in the next two chapters but it also becomes important to see how Bombay Talkies studio positioned itself in the variegated cultural field of silent and early talkie era of Indian cinema. Debashree Mukherjee in her essay “Good girls, bad girls,” while discussing the dearth of research on women’s contribution to early Indian cinema observes:

Late 19th and early 20th century Bombay was undergoing transformative changes in various ways. A new type of publicness as emerging, one mediated by mass production, mass circulation and mass consumption. Popular culture, whether print or theatre, contributed to the emergence of a public sphere marked by heterogeneity and mobility. (3)

Mukherjee uses the word ‘publicness’ to describe the variety of activity revolving around cinema. Sure there was definitely lot of activity surrounding cinema not only in Bombay but most of the urban parts of late colonial India. Her claim, however, that appears at the end of the quotation needs to be verified. Mukherjee uses the term 'public sphere' and tacitly suggests that the early Indian cinema culture produced heterogenous and new modes of publicness. What follows next is an enquiry into Jurgen Habermas’ idea of public sphere and how to account for the publicness in early Indian film culture.

2.2. Cinema, Public and cultural field

What appeared finally to be a dead end was the confrontation of materialism and idealism, the one wishing to the other the order of the universe with pure images in consciousness. It was necessary at any cost, to overcome this duality of image and movement, of consciousness and thing. Two very different authors were to undertake this task at about the same time: Bergson and Husserl. Each had his own war cry: all consciousness is consciousness of something (Husserl), or more strongly, all consciousness is something (Bergson). Undoubtedly many factors external to philosophy explain why the old position had become impossible. These were social and scientific factors which placed more and more movement into conscious life, and more and more images into the material world. How therefore was it possible not to take account of the cinema, which was being developed at that very moment, and

which would produce its own evidence of a movement-image? (Deleuze, Cinema 1 59)

Deleuze seems to indicate that the emergence of cinema puts forth the amalgamated coexistence of phenomena, images and consciousness. The account of audience running away from the screen, thinking train appearing on the screen is coming towards them, is an interesting moment in this context. The audience that watched a film for the first time did not know how to react to the experience. Though the movement on the screen was not new to the audience, the grandeur of it sure was. Peepshows, panorama, diorama, the magic lantern and the slide show were existent in the societies. But cinema existed on larger scale. Michael Chanan in The Dream That Kicks (1980) situates the early cinema in the ambivalent position between science and magic as it gives a sense of objective reproduction of the world and the magical creation simultaneously on the screen. For Chanan the advent of the film suddenly made science appear safe and entertaining when it was increasingly to be feared by ordinary people. Science with the technological development of the increasingly alienating industrial system was something to be feared of. However cinema at that point of time enjoyed mass presence with the masses being in the awe. The development of cinema was so fast that it crossed countries very quickly. This invention for entertainment, as has been mentioned in the earlier chapter, reached India as early as 1896. Harishchandra Sakharam Bhatavadekar (Savedada), being inspired by Lumiere films, in 1897 successfully made a film featuring two wrestlers Pundalik Dada and Krushna Nhavi. Bhatavadekar developed the film in London and in 1901 screened the film in Mumbai for viewers. Hiralal Sen and Jyotish Sarakar also tried their hand at film making in 1900. In 1911 S.N. Patankar, V.P. Divekar and P.A. Karandikar together made Savitri but the film had enough technical problems not to be screened. But apart from the early failure the three enthusiasts made a 10.000 ft long film titled Passion Versus Learning. Mujawar reports “The highlight of this film was that a young woman named Narmada Mande from Ahemadabad played a part in the film” (Phalke 21, my translation). The production of cinema in India took on rapidly. But as Sandria Freitag in her essay, “Visions of the Nation: Theorizing the Nexus between Creation, Consumption, and Participation in the Public Sphere,” puts it “But the scale of financing needed to fund filmmaking tied this process much more closely to world capitalistic processes for a much longer period”(Freitag 62). Indians

needed training and technology from Europe. To get back the money invested in making a film the filmmakers had to distribute their films in every possible corner of the world. The same applied to the filmmakers all over the world. But after the First World War America became the dominant distributor of films all over the world. Indian film makers easily found audiences in Burma and Ceylon and throughout South-east Asia. In East and South Africa there were a few overseas Indians who would watch Indian cinema.

Cinema with its ability to show movement definitely brought new possibilities of perception in both, European and Indian, cultures. There is a long line of predecessors before cinema acquired its own form. Invention of ‘peep shows,’ ‘magic lantern,’ ‘kinetoscope,’ ‘telegraph’ in 1840s, ‘telephone’ in 1876, and ‘primitive photograph’ in 1877 all played an important role in the invention of cinema. Out of all these, ‘stand still photography’, ‘magic lantern’, and ‘kinetoscope’ had a major helping hand in the formation of cinema.

In Horses and Other Animals in Motion: 45 Classic Photographic Sequences, we get to see the project by Eadweard Muybridge in which he took sequence of photographs with 12 cameras that captured the moment when the animal’s hooves are tucked under its belly (Eadweard Muybridge). Camera both still and moving made different kind of perception possible for human beings and this quality of technology did attract lot of attention. Some of the early experiments with the moving camera were to record the cityscapes and small actions.

In the period when cinema was silent, live music was played in most of the cinema halls along with the film screening. This was practiced to dissolve the loud sound of projector. There would be no camera movements and the camera would be static. It lacked close-ups, depth in shot, tracking shot, pan, and other such techniques. Cameras were heavy, which made it difficult to move them from one place to other. This put limitations on the frame; characters had to walk in and out of the frame. Circles or some other shapes were used to emphasize the visual images. Titles were used on the screen instead of dialogues. Cuts were used to capture all visual images so that none of the important details were missed out and cuts were also used for visual transitions. Movies produced after 1928 had sound on the film. Thomas Edison invented gramophone in 1870s. Lee De Forest developed ‘audion’, a special

electronic vacuum tube. De Forest invented practical sound on film ‘phonofilm’ in 1921. Hitchcock made first British dialogue film Blackmail in 1929. Clair made first French sound film Sous les toits de Paris in 1930. Vacuum tube made it possible for the first time to translate sound signals into electrical signals, and then into light signals that could be imprinted on film. The recording of sound is not exactly the same as recording of images. The microphone is a lens through which sound is filtered; also the recorder in sound works like the camera in images. Both, image and sound can be recorded linearly and can be edited later. But they have a major and a significant difference between them and that is the manner in which each of them is perceived. Sound must be recorded continuously while visuals do not need the unity of space and time to be recorded. The concept of ‘persistence of vision’ is missing in aural sense, that is why there is no ‘still sounds’ to compare with ‘still pictures’. Therefore sound is restricted in time (Monaco, How to Read a Film 174).

With the advent of sound, earlier restrictions on the film were reduced to a large extent. Now there was no need to display written titles on the screen. It enabled the camera to move more efficiently, thus the use of pan, tilt-up, tilt-down, tracking shot, parallel montage, and so on. Sound made it possible to build a long and complex structure of narrative. But there were new restrictions as the microphones with the cameras were not very powerful and the characters had to move according to the sound capturing range of the microphone. Also the microphones were sensitive to other louder sounds thus the shooting had to, most of the times, happen in the studios. Frame faced two major changes: on the one hand, it was possible for frame to follow the characters. In which case, camera became subjective and followed sound. On the other hand, frame was able to do various tasks at the same time. The frame could display visual images on screen, and could also display the sounds out of frame. Sound filled up the gaps of the narrative. Out of frame shots became possible with the sound being incorporated in the film.

One should also note that the ability to record sound on film negative and then synchronize it with visuals on the positive created the possibilities of technological reproduction. Particularly in Indian subcontinent the song and dance sequences became the highlight of the cinema. Before sound on film could be recorded cinema had emerged as one of the well organised industries in the west especially in the U.S.A. The processes of production, distribution and exhibition had been well

established by that time. No other industry has grown into such gigantic proportions within the short span of less than 20 years. The scenario of silent cinema in India remains obscured as very few films from the silent era are available to watch. Most of the films of that time perished. The Film Inquiry Report published in 1951 states that more than 90 percent of the silent films were immediately lost due to the lack of conservation.

There still are a few films preserved and available to study in the archives. Most of the silent films in India were of mythological genre. In such tumultuous times Himanshu Rai and Niranjan Pal together produced films that dealt with Indian religions and history. The Throw of Dice, Shiraz and Light of Asia were produced by Himanshu Rai with the help of foreign aid. As has been mentioned in the earlier chapter there were other film studios as well to incorporate foreign technicians for technical help. This happened more in the talkie era. Wilford Deming Jr., for example, trained Ardeshir Irani and Rustom Barucha before shooting of Alam Ara. Deming came to India as a technical expert from Hollywood, and as chief engineer for the Radio Installation Co. (Rico), Los Angeles. Deming did market Rico’s sound recording equipment in India. Deming was taken on payroll by New Theatres after he assembled and installed sound recording machine at their studio. New Theatres employed Deming to train home-grown talent and their own technicians for future concerns. Among these was Mukul Bose, the future sound recordist “…who reputedly developed an apparatus for playback in Dhoop Chhaon/Bhagya Chakra” (George 84). T. Marconi, Ellis Dungan and a few others were associated with other film studios. However there were certain elements in Indian film industry who expressed their discontent with the foreign technicians being involved in the Indian studios. They argued that collaboration with foreign elements in the production of Indian talkies was belittling to the nationalist ethos. An advertisement, in The Cinema, Vol. 8, No. 1, published in November 1933, of Imperial Film Co.’s Sulochana (1933) featuring Sulochana and D. Billimoria emphasized their ‘Swadeshi’ nature and their independence from foreign aid. Critical articles and reviews in film journals offered assessments of the productions of studios employing foreign technicians (3). An RCA sound expert Elmore B. Lyford and T. Marconi were criticised for their ‘horribly bad’ photography and sound work in the film Jore Barat ( 1931), produced by Madan Theatres (George 86). Heer Ranjha aka Hoor-E-Punjab (1933) was criticized for its

bad sound recording inspite of having C. W. Faulkner as a technical advisor and recordist. Heer Ranjha’s review appears in the section “Current Release,” in Filmland Vol. IV, Issue. No. 146, published on 25th March 1933. The review states “Recording is not good. Echoes and ground noise are noticed oftner than usual. Photography is flat and hard” (12). The existence of foreign technicians in Indian Film industry becomes instrumental in critical understanding of the evolving arguments around ‘swadeshi,’ (anti imperialist) movement and the film industry. Here we seem to graduate into the socio-political discourse surrounding films in India when nationalism was being propagated and practiced in variety of ways. D. G. Phalke’s interviews from Navayug are quoted by Ashish Rajadhyaksha, Madhava Prasad, Rachel Dwyer and other film theorists to talk about the relationship between cinema and nationalism in India. Joppan George for example raises this point of European tehnicians’ work being used as an element of ‘other’ to advertise films by some production houses. He gives example of Imperial Film Co.’s advertisement of the film Sulochana. The advertisement claims to be ‘swadeshi’ and independent of foreign aid (George 85). Various articles, film reviews and letters to the editors of the journals shed light on how the society in general practiced the consumption of cinema. It seems important here to look into the public opinions expressed and formed through readers’ letters to the editors and critical articles written by editors like Baburao Patel and K. A. Abbas in the film journals. Debashree Mukherjee in her essay, “Creating Cinema’s Reading Publics,” uses the idea of ‘public sphere’ to discuss the public discourse that emerges in film magazines like Bombay Chronicle and Filmindia. Mukherjee states:

There existed a wide variety of journals in a number of languages like English, Hindi, Urdu, and Gujarati. The nature of this reading public can be glimpsed in the ‘Letter to the Editor’ sections of dailies like The Times of India and the Bombay Chronicle. Here was a community of readers that believed it had a stake in the life of the emergent nation, a life played out in the public sphere. The bourgeois public sphere, as configured by certain English language print media, was dominated by concerns about imperialism, civic life, and progress. The entry of cinema into this informed space of two-way production of public discourse, thus makes for a fascinating moment. My attempt is to highlight the

significance of this discursive development as an industrial and affective site which needs to be studied as an integral part of the cinematic event. (166)

One of the major concepts to talk about public is ‘public sphere’; coined by Jurgen Habermas in his book The Structural Transformation of Public Sphere: An Enquiry into a Category of Bourgeois society, published in German in 1962 and first translated into English in 1989. What follows is a brief account of Habermas’ concept of public sphere and an attempt to analyse the public discourse surrounding early Indian cinema through ICCR, ICCE volumes and cine journals in the 1930s.

Public Sphere for Habermas entails social institutions that allow an open and rational debate between citizens in order to form public opinion. Habermas while discussing the categories ‘public’ and ‘private’ argues “We call events and occasions ‘public’ when they are open to all, in contrast to closed or exclusive affairs – as when we speak of public places or public houses (The Structural Tansformation of Public Sphere 1). Craig Calhoun in Habermas and the Public Sphere states:

Jurgen Habermas’s important early book The Structural Transformation of the Public Sphere asks when and under what conditions the argument of mixed companies could become authoritative bases for political action…What are the social conditions, he asks, for a rational-critical debate about public issues conducted by private persons willing to let arguments and not statuses determine decisions?

After discussing the development of Europe from the feudal economic structure to the capitalist structure Habermas explains:

The bourgeois public sphere may be conceived above all as the sphere of private people come together as a public; they soon claimed the public sphere regulated from above against the public authorities themselves, to engage them in a debate over the general rules governing relations in the basically privatized but publicly relevant sphere of commodity exchange and social labour. The medium of this political confrontation was peculiar and without historical precedent: people’s public use of their reason (öffentliches Räsonnement). (27)

The debate can be conducted in person or through exchanges of letters and other written communications, and may be mediated by journals, newspapers and electronic forms of communication. Ideally the public sphere should be open to all, and agreement should be secured through the force of better argument, rather than through any exercise or threat of physical force. Habermas’s early arguments explain that the bourgeois public sphere emerged from the private sphere of the individual. The already established salons helped the ‘art critic’ to emerge as a new occupation. The art critic in the first half of the eighteenth century, according to Habermas, “…assumed a peculiarly dialectical task: he viewed himself at the same time as the public’s mandatory and as its educator” (41). The art critic would analyse and talk about the art work and the artist and sometimes he would shape the public’s ways of thinking about literature.

In Europe the public sphere came into existence with the maturation of capitalism in the eighteenth century. It was a bourgeois public sphere, which is to say that it was a space within which the members of rising commercial and professional classes met and communicated. The working class and the aristocracy were largely excluded. Within earlier feudal societies, the dominant aristocracy had more or less direct control over all aspects of social life, including the economy. As the bourgeoisie became increasingly powerful, not least in that it came to control the economy, wresting control of the economy away from the state, it began to seek an increasing say in government policy. Government policy may have a major impact upon the economic interests of the bourgeoisie who in turn, therefore, seek to protect those interests. The idea here was to make the state responsive to the bourgeoisie’s expression of its needs and interests in public opinion.

The public sphere is thus an intermediary between the public realm of the state and the private interests of individual members of the bourgeoisie. Bourgeois subjectivity is formed through the public sphere as public sphere not only brings together the voices of many private individuals but also it facilitates the articulation of the individual bourgeoisie’s sense of self.

Habermas distinguishes between the literary public sphere and political public sphere. In eighteenth century there was a fundamental development in literature. For the first time, in the form of the bourgeoisie, there existed a leisured and educated

class that had the means to buy art and the time to enjoy it. While these conditions affected all the arts, commercialising them and freeing artists from the patronage of church or state, the most distinctive form of art to arise was the novel. The bourgeoisie was using its literacy and leisure to write letters. The first novels were, in effect, collections of model letters. The rise of the novel has further implications as people reading prior to the eighteenth century were reading classics. There was no question about the classics’ status as great art. The novel precisely because it was new, posed a problem to its reader about its worth. The literary public sphere thus began to take shape in the requirement to debate and justify one’s exercise of taste. And literature trained the bourgeois reader, not just in self-expression, but also in public argument. Habermas states:

While the early institutions of the bourgeois public sphere originally were closely bound up with aristocratic society as it became dissociated from the court, the ‘great’ public that formed in the theatres, museums, and concerts was bourgeois in its social origin. Around 1750 its influence began to predominate. The moral weeklies which flooded all of Europe already catered to a taste that made the mediocre Pamela the best seller of the century. They already sprang from the needs of a bourgeois reading public that later on would find genuine satisfaction in the literary forms of the domestic drama and the psychological novel. (43)

This literary public sphere later on got transformed into political public sphere. According to Calhoun “Britain serves Habermas as the model case of the development of the public sphere….after the Glorious Revolution, that national-level political opposition shifted away from resort to violence, so that ‘through the critical debate of the public, it took the form of a permanent controversy between the governing party and the opposition’” (14). It is in the fifth chapter of the book that Habermas discusses the structural transformation of the public sphere. Habermas argues that from the nineteenth century the institutions that warranted the accordance of the critically debating public was weakened. Habermas claims:

When the family lost its link with the world of letters, the bourgeois salon that had complemented and partly also replaced the reading societies of the eighteenth century also went out of fashion….In the course of our century,

the bourgeois forms of sociability have found substitutes that have one tendency in common despite their regional and national diversity: abstinence from literary and political debate....the characteristic relationship of a privacy oriented toward an audience was also no longer present when people went to the movies together, listened to the radio, or watched TV. The communication of the public that debated critically about culture remained dependent on reading pursued in the closed off privacy of the home. The leisure activities of the culture consuming public, on the contrary, themselves take place within a social climate, and they do not require any further discussion. (163)

This is one of the reasons to avert using the idea of public sphere when it comes to formation of communities surrounding early Indian cinema. Cinema viewership is a collective experience and its economy driven status does not allow critical rational debate around it. However Rajeev Bhargava’s analysis of public sphere in India has to be taken into account here. Rajeev Bhargava in the introduction to the text Civil society, public sphere and citizenship attempts conditions in which it is possible to say that public sphere exists or does not exist in India. Bhargava states:

By ‘public sphere’ I mean a common space, in principle accessible to all, which anyone may enter with views on the common good realised wholly or partially: a maidan, a coffee house, an exhibition hall, the paan shop on the road side, the sweet shop in the locality as also the discursive and representational space available in newspapers, magazines, journals, radio, television and now the internet. (14)

While defining ‘public sphere’ which is different from civil society, Bhargava argues:

A public sphere on the other hand consist of intercommunicating spaces available in principle to everybody and into which people may bring issues that concern everyone. If this feature distinguishes the public sphere from civil society, it also demarcates it from the state, since those who participate in the public sphere do not directly exercise political power. They do not command the official apparatus of the state. However, because they seek to influence decision-making processes of the state, they maintain a permanent relation with it. For voluntary associations in civil society, an engagement with the state is only a last resort. The raison d’être of the public sphere, however, is to

exert influence on state policy. The public sphere is outside the institutions of the state but directly concerned with what occurs there. Public opinion formed in the public sphere is meant to roll back into the thinking and activity of voluntary associations and to roll forward onto state institutions.

What makes this sphere public? It is public first because it is accessible to all. Second, because people enter here with views on matters that affect the whole body of citizens, and not themselves alone. However, a public sphere construed thus has not realised its full potential. This is only a partially realised public sphere; primarily because people in it are indifferent to the process by which the common good is formulated. A common mind about the common good is formulated. A common mind about the common good is not arrived at through discussion, dialogue and public deliberation but is simply presumed to exist. (16)

Bhargava chooses the relationship between an individual and family discussed by Habermas (48) in the second chapter of The Structural Transformation of the Public Sphere to state that in India the conditions were different. Bhargava argues:

But is the story replicated in non-western societies such as India? Plainly not. If so, then we are drawn towards two different conclusions. One, that the particular set of relations in India between the family and the individual is not conducive to the development of the modern autonomous individual. Alternatively, the trajectory of the formation of autonomous individuals is different in India. Though a close resemblance exists between unrestrained communication within the family and the literary public sphere and rational critical debate in the liberal public sphere, there are also important differences. First, the objective or at least the unintended consequence of free communication within the family and the literary public sphere is self- clarification. The liberal public sphere is guided by a different though related aim: the clarification of social needs and public purposes. (20-21)

Bhargava points out some of the objections raised to Habermas’ idea of public sphere. Habermas according to Bhargava overestimates the degeneration of public sphere as his account of the twentieth century public sphere is based on the audience of television in the European suburbs. The absence of nationalism and impact of religion

is also an objectionable aspect in Habermas’ theorisation of the public sphere. According to Bhargava, Habermas’ idea of public sphere appears to be restrictive as his focus on debate and discussion demands conformation to the rational debate. Rational debate is generally not followed in the democratic politics, believes Bhargava (23). The final objection, element of debate in public sphere, raised by Bhargava is important because discourse surrounding cinema in early twentieth century India has the elements of debate and discussion but these elements are difficult to be considered as a public sphere. Bhargava states:

Finally, Habermas’ conception is found to be too flat and unitary and is unable to accommodate multiple overlapping and contending conceptions of public spaces. There are many publics and counter-publics and, therefore, different kinds of public spheres to which Habermas’ account appears to be insufficiently sensitive. (23)

In the case of early cinema in India discussions and debates surrounding cinema existed through film journals but the conversations through letters and art critic’s essays did not contain critical rationality. After all cinema and cinema journals were commodities of mass consumption. However there were journals revolving around activities of theatre. Journals in vernacular languages contain enough evidence of public opinion being recorded in terms of letter exchanges taking place around themes and actors of the plays. In Maharashtra Vividh Dnyan Vistaar, Rangabhoomi, Manoranjan Nibandha Chandrika, Chitramay Jagat were some of the literary journals in Marathi language devoted to literary activities These literary journals do not merely discuss plays, but also discuss essays that stimulate discussions on a range of practical, scientific and social topics.

The ICCR, ICCE Volumes and film journals suggest that the public that opined about cinema and issues related to it were homogeneous in terms of education and economic interests. The working classes, though represented, are not the direct participants in the debate surrounding quota system and censorship issues. But the consumption of art on the part of working class does suggest their taste for a particular kind of art. They are to be considered an important agency of consumers of Indian cinema. Their taste is being debated in the ICCR. But there is a strong

possibility of working class’s taste being used to secure the theatres for Indian films and not the films sourced from America and Britain.

But the ideas of governmentality and discourse surrounding it was definitely given by British. The governmentality practiced by British in India was a part of modernity. In India British tried to determine and officialise collective identities such as caste and religion in the process of creating a public sphere. The concepts and the institutions that consecrate public sphere, free press, voluntary associations, avenues for free debate and enquiry in the public interest, are modern Europe’s gifts to the people they considered less fortunate than themselves. This modern public life in India was garnered by British. British introduced India to Modern State. One of the symptoms of its modernity was that its techniques of governance were very closely tied to the techniques of measurement. They surveyed land and crop output, minerals, Indian bodies, diets and life spans. An example of this governmental concern with measurement was Indian censuses. The first census in India was published in 1872. According to Dipesh Chakrabarty “All these studies were produced in the cause and in the process of governing India. A count made of population of Bombay in 1780 for instance divided the population into ‘socio religious communities” (Modernity and Ethniciy in India 3375).

The ICCR is to be seen from this point of view. The report contains figures of the existing theatres and their sitting capacities. These reports also contain the details of profits earned by films and the details of what films were screened in which theatres. Priya Jaikumar’s claim, in her essay “More Than Morality: The Indian Cinematograph Committee Interviews (1927),” that in the 1920s the British India government’s interest in Indian film audiences was governed by racial anxiety and not by the desire for economic profit and British were concerned with the content of the North American films viewed by Indian audiences rather than screening more British films in India is very suggestive. It was very difficult in fact for Britishers to exploit India as a market to circulate their films because India’s film market was completely captured by the United States until Indian films managed to attract the audience with mythology already popular and without quota or subsidy system.

It is possible to analyse the films produced by Bombay Talkies for the kind of modernity discourse they represent. Some of the films very strongly represent the

nationalistic sentiments through the characters, the situations they are in and their appearance. Thus to anlyse the accounts appearing in the ICCR and ICCE, using different conception of community formation seems appropriate.

My contention here is that Pierre Bourdieu’s ideas of symbolic capital, economic capital, taste based distinction, agencies determining the production, circulation, and consumption of artefacts become very important to analyse the way cinema influenced society and got influenced in return by various elements of society in the 1920s and 1930s. But for now I think it becomes important to take into account the emergence of the ideas of modernity in India.

2.3. Deterritorialized Modernity

Deleuze and Guattari describe the process of deterittorialization in various ways in at least three books they collaborated to write. In Kafka Towards Minor Literatures(1986) they describe deterritorialization as mutating content, forcing enunciations and expressions to disarticulate the major language. Deleuze and Guattari define deterritorialization as the movement by which something escapes or departs from a given territory. The process of territory formation, deterritorialisation and reterritorialization are inextricably entangled in any given social field. Deterritorialization comes across as a complex process involving change in at least a deterritorialising element and a territory. In What is Philosophy?, Deleuze and Guattari state that “Deterritorialisation can be physical, mental or spiritual” (68). Deterritorialisation can be understood as movement producing change; to deterritorialise is to free up the fixed relations that contain a body and exposing it to new organisations. Deterritorialisation is bound up with correlative processes of reterritorialisation which means ways in which deterritorialised elements recombine and enter into new relations. I use Deleuze and Guattari’s concepts ‘deterritorialization,’ and ‘reterritorialization’ to account for the ideas of modernity that came to India because of the access to the European culture. Aacharya Jawadekar in his book Aadhunik Bharat published in 1953 quotes from Lord Metcalf’s, Life of Lord Metcalf,

If the argument be, that the spread of knowledge may eventually be fatal to our rule in India, I maintain that whatever may be the consequence, it is our duty to communicate the benefits of knowledge. If India could only be

preserved as a part of the British Empire, by keeping its inhabitants in a state of ignorance, our domination may be a curse to the country and ought to cease. But I see more ground for just apprehension in ignorance itself I look to the increase of knowledge with a hope that it may strengthen our Empire. (26)

Jawadekar’s use of the above passage from Metcalf shows his willingness to find the logic for the formation of modernity in India and the role played by British administration in that situation. After a few passages Jawadekar translates and quotes from Mountstuart Elphinston’s letter to John Malcolm:

Thus it is imperative that our connection with the natives is going to be severed. Instead of the natives breaking the connection, and remaining barbarians, the connection should be cut off by us after their reforms; this should benefit us as the colonisers will not lose the business and institutions established in India. (29, my translation)

Jawadekar uses the above quotations to mention that the Britishers always thought about how to govern Indian subcontinent. Jawadekar later in his book refers to English writer Frederick John Shore’s 1835 published book Indian Army, and states that Shore believed that Indians don’t have love for their country. They are loyal to the one who pays them. Indians lack nationalism. Metclaf approved the freedom of the press and had said that ignorance was more dangerous than the spread of knowledge and that if England had the choice she had a definite responsibility to prefer the diffusion of knowledge to the perpetuation of ignorance. He later states “…do what we will, we cannot prevent the progress of knowledge, and it is undoubtedly our duty to promote it whatever be the consequence” (qtd. in Natarajan 63). Munro, Elphinston and Malcolm, British officials in the nineteenth century India, were for the restrictions on the press while Metcalf was for the free press. Metcalf asked Macaulay, who was his Law Councillor, to frame an act of changing licensing process for registering. Macaulay framed a uniform law for all India which would render an individual free to print without permission “…but still render him/her liable for punishment for printing sedition and calumny” (Natarajan 63). This entire discourse revolving around access to printing and press is important from the point of view of public sphere as well as the discourse of modernity.

Dipesh Chakrabarty in his book Habitations of Modernity: essays in the wake of subaltern studies (2002), states that modernity is easy to inhabit but difficult to define. The task of defining modernity seemed to be very clear in the nineteenth century and the early twentieth century for political philosophers such as J. S. Mill and L.T. Hobhouse. Chakrabarty in the introduction to the book states:

Following the tenets of the European Enlightenment, many Western intellectuals thought of modernity as the rule of institutions that delivered us from the thrall of all that was unreasonable and irrational. Those who fell outside its ambit could be described as premodern. Western powers in their imperial mode saw modernity as coeval with the idea of progress. Nationalists saw in it the promise of development.( Habitations of Modernity xix)

Dipesh Chakrabarty who has been associated with the Oxford University Press Series Subaltern Studies, launched in 1982, considers modernity, the nation-state, and the idea of history to be important and controversial topics. This project was launched under the Ranajit Guha’s intellectual leadership and the above topics as Dipesh Chakrabarty states stemmed from discussion amongst the group members. Most of the writings on the issues of modernity, according to Dipesh Chakrabarty, revolve around “…contesting the idea that modernity has any necessary, ideal-typical form. Some scholars prefer the label alternative or plural modernities, while others write about modernity at large” (Habitations of Modernity 20). Though these ideas are useful, the scholars are still left with the task of defining what modernity is. Chakrabarty is also concerned about “How do we think about the global legacy of the European Enlightenment in lands far away from Europe in geography or history? How do we envision or document ways of being modern that will speak to that which is shared across the world as well as to that which belongs to human cultural diversity?” (Habitations of Modernity Xi). He seems to suggest ways through this book; ways of doing away with the fixed binaries and watertight distinctions like modernity and tradition. Chakrabarty’s essays in this book deal with the nature of modernity in colonial and postcolonial India. For Chakrabarty “This strong split between emotion and reason, I suggest, is part of the story of colonialism in India” (Habitations of Modernity 24). He refers to Sumit Sarkar’s ideas in The Swadeshi Movement in Bengal, 1903-1908, published in 1977, to state that Sarkar fails to give insights into the moments in the history of India’s political and public life when the European

distinction between the sacred and secular appears to collapse. Sarkar, it seems, looks at history as the story of continuous struggle between the forces of reason and humanism, on the one side, and those of emotion and faith, on the other. Sarkar claims that the important theme of the swadeshi movement is the conflict between modernism and traditionalism. The conflict is between an attitude that demands social reforms, through the evaluation of issues and ideas by the criteria of reason transcending limits of caste and religion and the opposite trend that follows the established social mores in the name of tradition. And this tradition is always addressed as the glorious past. Chakrabarty further quotes Scottish missionary Alexander Duff, writing in 1839, for whom Hinduism was a stupendous system of errors and even the act of mastering English must make the student tenfold less the child of superstition than before. This conflict between Indian tradition and rationality launched “colonial hyperrationalism among Indian intellectuals” (Habitations of Modernity 25). For Chakrabarty this scenario creates a methodological problem for the Indian intellectuals in terms of how to deal with the manifestations of ideas of modernity in the late nineteenth and early twentieth century.

The problem is, rather, that we do not have analytic categories in our aggressively secular academic discourse that do justice to the real, everyday, and multiple connections that we have to what we, in becoming modern, have come to see as nonrational. Tradition/modernity, rational/nonrational, intellect/emotion-these untenable and problematic binaries have haunted our self representations in social-science language since the nineteenth century.10 (Habitations of Modernity 26)

Chakrabarty also refers to Barun De, Susie Tharu and K. Lalitha to state that Indian thinkers were prone to think that what India possessed as a result of colonial modernization was only a bad version of something that was unmixed. And the blame for this was given to colonialism. Thus the sense one gets out of this situation is “Colonialism stopped us from being fully modern” (Habitations of Modernity 28). One of the most important passages from Chakrabarty’s book for this study, which I would like to quote in entirety, deals with the transformation of ideas from Europe to India.

The Enlightenment’s story of the struggle of science/rationalism against faith/religion-which in Europe produces all kinds of hybrid solutions-gets repeated in India without attention to the process of translation and the resultant hybridities. For both sides of the equation are violated in translating them from the European context into our past and present practices. The history of our hyperrationalism is not the same as that of Enlightenment rationalism, and the practices that we gather under the name religion do not repeat the history of that European category of thought. Such translations are by definition hybrid or incomplete. It may precisely be an irony of any modernist understanding of modernity that we are constantly called on to study with the purest of categories that which is necessarily impure and hybrid, to treat translations that are necessarily incomplete as though their incompleteness is nothing but a hurtful betrayal of history.

An attitude of incredulity towards the metanarrative of the European Enlightenment, however, moves us from the register of lament to that of irony. But, while that is only the first step, it prepares us for opening up our histories to other possibilities. (Habitations of Modernity 29)

Apart from the ending lines of this rather long quotation, what is interesting is the use of words “translation” and “hybridity”. By translation, it seems, Chakrabarty means the movement of ideas of modernity, rationality and the Enlightenment milieu that come to India passing through passages of time and space as a result of colonisation. And there are attempts of doing things with these ideas; attempts that mark the social activities that would be for modernity principles and against them. These ideas were laid open to new territories to be inhabited by new discourses of social practices. Metcalf’s decision for the free press act allowed people to discuss personal as public through journals and newspapers. As Chakrabarty states, in his essay Provincializing Europe: Postcoloniality and The Critique of History, published in 1992, that two of India’s most prominent nationalist intellectuals of the nineteenth century considered British rule as the necessary period to happen as the “…tutelage that Indians had to undergo in order to prepare precisely for what the British denied but extolled as the end of all history: citizenship and the nation-state” (Provincializing Europe 340). Chakrabarty mentions that the British rule paved the way for practices, institutions and the discourse of bourgeois individualism in place in the Indian soil. Sudden

flourish of four basic genres, that help express the modern self, novel, biography, autobiography and history account for the visibility of modern individualism. Along with the four genres, modern industry, technology, medicine, a quasi bourgeois legal system formed by Britishers also comes under the rubrics of modern state. While giving example of Nirad Chaudhuri’s autobiography Chakrabarty points towards the expression of ‘private’ as being modern and thus coming into the realm of public. At the end of the essay Chakrabarty makes it clear that academic discourse surrounding modernity, especially his attempt by writing this essay:

…is not a call for cultural relativism or for atavistic, nativistic histories. Nor is this a programme for a simple rejection of modernity which would be, in many situations, politically suicidal. I ask for a history that deliberately makes visible, within the very structure of its narrative forms, its own repressive strategies and practices, the part it plays in collusion with the narratives of citizenships in assimilating to the projects of the modern state all other possibilities of human solidarity. (Provincializing Europe 353)

This should help us to get back to the issue of public sphere in India. Neeladri Bhattacharya in his essay “Notes Towards a Conception of The Colonial Public,” published in 2005, tries to investigate the conceptual power and limitations of the term public Sphere and the peculiarities of its history in the context of India’s colonial modernity. Bhattacharya explains “Habermas discusses the emergence of the public sphere in eighteenth-century France as a realm of critical public discussion on matters of general interest, removed from the regulating control of the state” (Bhattacharya 131). Public sphere was a space that nurtured critical opinion and questioned the premises of public authority and power. It replaced the public sphere in which the ruler’s power was merely represented before the people. However with the expansion of capitalism the scenario for public sphere changed. Social relations with the expansion of capitalism assumed the form of exchange relations. The commodity owners gained private autonomy. The realm of the private was emancipated from the controls of the state. And law became a guarantee of the legal status of a person no longer defined by estate and birth. In this scenario critical judgement was constituted and exercised through the institutions that made up the public sphere-the salons, the cafes, the clubs and the periodicals. Bhattacharya further states,

In tracing the history of the public sphere, Habermas operates with a double teleology. We see in his narrative a linear unfolding of critical reason on the one hand, and market and private property on the other. The history of reason and market are intertwined, each feeding on the other, and together they march irresistibly forward from a time of constraints to a time of freedom. The triumph of the market and private property is at the same time a triumph of reason. (132)

Habermas’ formulation of the concept public sphere and the social conditions for its formulations compel one to rethink the entire setup when it comes to colonial India. The social conditions in colonial India were different from what France, Britain and Germany had. Bhattacharya uses three examples to talk about law as a space for the construction of individual identities. The laws by Britishers in colonial India reclassified social relations into fixed determinate publicly recognised categories and public codes. Bhattacharya observes “Once specified in government Acts the rights of each category were seen to be explicitly stated and universally understood” (133). The first example, which I mention here is an incident that took place on March 1862 in Surat. A judge at the Faujdari Adalat in Surat forbade Manockjee Cowasjee Entee, a Parsee and an assessor, from entering the court without removing his shoes. Bhattacharya highlights the two languages used by Manockjee; the language of law and the language of tradition:

He bows to the judge and speaks with deference and civility, but seeks to demonstrate that the actions of the judge are arbitrary, that they have no foundation in any publicly encoded law. He demands, insistently and repeatedly, that the judge act in legal ways, show the rule that bans the wearing of shoes in the court, and conform to procedures that have been publicly formalised. (138)

Manockjee comes up with the discourse of tradition later saying that the Britishers do not know the native traditions which are plural in nature and they are insensitive to this fact. Manockjee emphasises that the judge violated his dignity and his religion. For Bhattacharya “…within this regime of public law, a new language of reason developed- a new language of law that provided legal legitimation to the practices of the colonial state” (139). Using this criterion, colonial state branded many local

practices as legal or illegal according to their liberal sensibilities. Bhattacharya further states that public sphere in this situation is not just a space for private individual to appear as public, acknowledge its commonality with the common public concern. It is also a space where communities are forced to come together to reconstitute themselves as a public. Here Bhattacharya starts putting forward his observations on the possible nature of public sphere in India “If the logic of capital and the centralising and inclusive thrust of modernity make it impossible not to come together, this logic never dissolves bounded communities into an amorphous public” (140). Bhattacharya states that the public sphere in India is difficult to conceptualise as a single, homogenous, consensual, unitary space. One of the most important reasons for stating so is that it was deeply segmented along the lines of religion, caste and various aspects around which community formation happened. This segmentation of public is not the past of the modern public or the early stages of its formation; it has become its intrinsic and stable characteristic and defines its cultural richness and polyvalence. I think it is important to note Bhattacharya’s suggestion that we need to understand and study how this segmentation takes on new forms and how the different segmented publics connect within the national public. This brings us closer to talk about early Indian cinema and the community formations around cinema. I would argue that looking at the community formation around cinema from the point of view of ‘public sphere’ or ‘literary public sphere’ would not yield interesting insights into the early Indian film culture. Instead Pierre Bourdieu’s approach of relational network appears to be more appealing.

In the first chapter we have already discussed some of the issues that Minishita Dass and Priya Jaikumar deal with in their essays on early silent cinema in India. Now looking at the early Indian cinema from the point of view of audience’s taste would prove helpful here. This should enable to take further the argument that early Indian film culture makes visible community formations, based on audience’s taste for variety of genres, based on their ‘habitus’. Bombay Talkies studio produced films, and the early international collaborations between Himansu Rai, Emelka and Ufa take on certain strategies to operate in the cultural field of film production. Film journals like Filmindia, Filmland, Varieties Weekly play an important role to legitimise these strategies undertaken by the producers of films.

2.4. Cultural field and classification by taste

A work of art, according to Pierre Bourdieu, has meaning and interest “…only for someone who possesses the cultural competence that is the code, into which it is encoded” (Distinction 2). The possession of this code, or ‘cultural capital,’ is accumulated through a long process of acquisition or inculcation which includes the teachings from the family or group members (family education), educated members of the social formation (diffuse education) and social institutions (institutionalized education) (2). In the ICCE while answering the question on the kind of films popular amongst the Indian audience, the interviewees distinguish the audience watching Indian films based on their education. In the written statement of the Bombay Cinema and Theatres Trade Association the distinction between the audience watching Indian cinema and the audience watching American cinema is emphasised. The evidence states: In Bombay 1/3 of the attendance from the educated Indians and 2/3 of the attendance from the illiterate classes of the Indians….In Fort, Bombay, where Foreign pictures are used, educated Indians, Europeans, and Anglo-Indians only… The most popular films with the Indian audiences are those they can easily follow. It means India Productions in the first instance, and in the Next place, foreign pictures of the type of comedies, comedy-dramas, and thrilling pictures of the adventure variety. (ICCE Vol.I 1)

Educated classes on the other hand are described to be fond of “Topical Indian News, stories from the National History and Literature” (1). More interesting and obvious observation comes from the Bombay Cinema and Theatres Trade Association members when they state:

No special consideration is necessary in the censorship of Foreign films of Social nature, as the illiterate people in India never care to see Social films of any Foreign country as they can hardly follow them, and, consequently, cannot enjoy such pictures, good or bad. On the other hand, the cultured class of people of this country who have a taste for Society pictures, are fully able to understand the sentiment in such pictures and can appreciate them in the right direction. (5)

It becomes evident here that the audience of the silent cinema in 1920s, in India, was divided based on their competence to assimilate or not assimilate certain kind of films. Add to this the literacy issue and we have a cultural field in which distinction amongst the audience is made based on the cultural capital.

According to Bourdieu’s theoretical model, any social formation is structured by the way of hierarchically organized series of fields (the economic field, the political field, the educational field, the cultural field, etc.), each defined as structured space with its own laws of functioning and its own relation of force independent of those of politics and the economy, except, in the cases of the economic and political fields. Each field is relatively autonomous but structurally homologous with the others. Its structure is determined by the relations between the positions agents occupy in the field. A field is a dynamic concept in that a change in agents’ positions necessarily results in a change in the field’s structure. Bourdieu defines field as:

…a network, or a configuration, of objective relations between positions objectively defined, in their existence and in the determinations they impose upon their occupants, agents or institutions, by their present and potential situation (situs) in the structure of the distribution of species of power (or capital) whose possession commands access to the specific profits that are at stake in the field, as well as by their objective relation to other positions (domination, subordination, homology, etc.). Each field presupposes, and generates by its very functioning, the belief in the value of the stakes it offers. (Towards a Reflexive Sociology 39)

According to Bourdieu a field, for study, like ‘artistic’ or ‘literary,’ needs to be constructed as “…a space of positions and the space of the position-takings” (The Field of Cultural Production 30). This literary field gets defined by the positions taken by the various participants in it. In case of early Indian cinema the genres like mythology, comedy dramas, thrillers, adventures, and socials get defined by their positions as dominant or not very popular genres amongst the audience. Bourdieu argues:

The space of literary or artistic position-takings, i.e. the structured set of the manifestations of the social agents involved in the field-literary or artistic works…is inseparable from the space of literary or artistic positions defined

by possession of a determinate quantity of specific capital (recognition) and, at the same time, by occupation of a determinate position in the structure of the distribution of this specific capital….The network of objective relations between positions subtends and orients the strategies which the occupants of the different positions implement in their struggle to defend or improve their positions (i.e. their position takings), strategies which depend for their force and form on the position each agent occupies in the power relations. (The Field of Cultural Production 30)

What comes across in the field of early Indian cinema is the struggle of the agents, i.e. the producers, distributors and the audience to claim for certain kind of capital. One of the most illuminating passages in Bourdieu’s above quoted essay states the problem of practicing social history of arts and academic disciplines. Bourdieu observes:

One of the major difficulties of the social history of philosophy, art or literature is that it has to reconstruct these spaces of original possible which, because they were part of the self-evident givens of the situation, remained unremarkable and are therefore likely to be mentioned in contemporary accounts, chronicles or memoirs. It is difficult to conceive of the vast amount of information which is linked to membership of a field and which all contemporaries immediately invest in their reading of works: information about institutions-e.g. academies, journals, magazines, galleries, publishers, etc.- and about persons, their relationships, liaisons and quarrels, information about the ideas and problems which are ‘in the air’ and circulate orally in gossip and rumour.(31-32)

Here Bourdieu differs from the structuralists like Ferdinand de Saussure and Lévi- Strauss and Russian formalist like Todorov. Structural and formalist studies of work of art according to Bourdieu are ‘systemic analyses’ of work of arts and they refuse to consider the possibilities of positions that a work of art or an artist can take in the specific field. Bourdieu also criicises the Russian Formalists and particularly the concept ‘defamiliarization,’ stating that the change in the field is not result of mere ‘automization’ given by the repetitive use of the literary devices as a means of expression. But, states Bourdieu:

More concretely, they forget that the existence, form and direction of change depend not only on the ‘state of the system’, i.e. the ‘repertoire’ of possibilities which it offers, but also on the balance of forces between social agents who have entirely real interests in the different possibilities available to them as stakes and who deploy every sort of strategy to make one set or the other prevail. (34)

Thinking of the field of literature or art in the relational mode helps to escape not only isolated analysis of a work of art but also the overt analysis of social conditions of production and consumption, for example the interests of dominant class (Bourdieu, The Field of Cultural Production 34). Bourdieu’s criticism of ‘internal modes of analysis’ (structuralism and formalism) and ‘external mode of analysis’ (of Marxist inspiration, George Lukács, Theodor Adorno) can be read in his essay “Principles for a Sociology of Cultural works”. In this relational mode the institutions like education systems play an important role. The ‘constitution of aesthetic gaze’, by which Bourdiu means, analytical practices and the belief in the value of a work, is instituted by an agency like educational institution. Thus Bourdieu states:

Given that works of art exist as symbolic objects only if they are known and recognized, that is, socially instituted as works of art and received by spectators capable of knowing and recognizing them as such, the sociology of art and literature has to take as its object not only the material production of the value of the work or, which amounts to the same thing, of belief in the value of the work. (The Field of Cultural Production 37)

Thus the producers of the meaning or value of the work of art are also need to be taken into consideration in the field of cultural production. The critics, publishers and gallery directors and other agents operate together and indirectly produce consumers of work of art who are capable of recognizing the work of art and its value. The agents in this field play an important role in legitimizing or delegitimizing a work of art.

Bourdieu distinguishes between the ‘field of restricted production’ and the ‘field of large-scale production’. The field of restricted production, Bourdieu states, is “…a system of producing cultural goods (and the instruments for appropriating these goods) objectively destined for a public of producers of cultural goods, and the field

of large-scale cultural production, specifically organized with a view to the production of cultural goods destined for non-producers of cultural goods, ‘the public at large’” (The Market of Symbolic Goods 116). The field of restricted production, according to Bourdieu, breaks away from the general public, the non producing agents in the field, the bourgeois, to exert its autonomy. This breaking away from the general public entails the specific skills for the consumers of these goods. The field of restricted production in this sense becomes autonomous, free from the influences of fields external to it and making these external elements conform to its ways of operations (115). Bourdieu argues:

To put it another way, the more the field is capable of functioning as a field of competition for cultural legitimacy, the more individual production must be oriented towards the search for culturally pertinent features endowed with value in the field’s own economy. This confers properly cultural value on the producers by endowing them with marks of distinction (a speciality, a manner, a style) recognized as such within the historically available cultural taxonomies. (The Market of Symbolic Goods 117)

The field of large-scale production on the other hand takes into account the public and consumption of its goods. Bourdieu describes the field of large-scale production as:

The field of large-large scale production, whose submission to external demand is characterized by the subordinate position of cultural producers in relation to the controllers of production and diffusion media, principally obeys the imperatives of competition for conquest of the market. The structure of its socially neutralized product is the result of the economic and social conditions of its production. (The Market of Symbolic Goods 125)

The field of early Indian cinema is the field of large-scale production. The technical and aesthetic choices of a work of art in this field are determined by the ambiguity of the general or average public, the masses. The processes of production, distribution and consumption of any work of art also take into account the economic universe. In the case of field of restricted production which is considered as an autonomous field the gain for the producer and the distributor or publisher is the ‘symbolic capital’. According to Bourdieu:

‘Symbolic capital’ is to be understood as economic or political capital that is disavowed, misrecognized and thereby recognized, hence legitimate, a ‘credit’ which, under certain conditions, and always in the long run, guarantees ‘economic’ profits. Producers and vendors of cultural goods who ‘go commercial’ condemn themselves, and not only from an ethical or aesthetic point of view, because they deprive themselves of the opportunities open to those who can recognize the specific demands of this universe and who, by concealing from themselves and others the interests at stakes in their practice, obtain the means of deriving profits from disinterestedness. In short, when the only usable, effective capital is the (mis)recognised, legitimate capital called ‘prestige’ or ‘authority’, the economic capital that cultural undertakings generally require cannot secure the specific profits produced by the field - not the ‘economic’ profits they always imply – unless it is reconverted into symbolic capital. (The Production of Belief 75)

Symbolic capital in this sense becomes important to analyse the strategies used by the producers of work of art. In the field of cultural production if all the agents participate they have to practice their strategies in terms of production, circulation and consumption. According to Bourdieu these practices are result of the agents’ ‘habitus’. Habitus is an important concept in Bourdieu’s several of books and essays. Bourdieu while describing ‘habitus’ in his book Distinction (1984) states:

The habitus is both the generative principle of objectively classifiable judgements and the system of classification (principium divisionis) of these practices. It is in the relationship between the two capacities which define the habitus, the capacity to produce classifiable practices and works, and the capacity to differentiate and appreciate these practices and works, and products (taste), that the represented social world, i.e., the space of life-styles, is constituted. (170)

The agents who participate in the various fields in the society have personal histories with them. These histories entail their experiences in daily life. The social strata they live in has an impact on these participants. These experiences to a certain extent might be similar to those who occupy the same social strata. This conglomeration of personal, family histories, experiences are embodied in the agents’ movements, bodily

as well as mental. Various social practices that an agent participates in get distinguished because of the habitus. Bourdiue in his lecture “Physical space, Social space and Habitus,” delivered at the Department of Sociology at the University of Oslo, in 1995 states:

...habitus are also structuring structures, different classifying schemes classification principles, different principles of vision and division, different tastes. Habitus make different differences; they implement distinctions between what is good and what is bad, between what is right and what is wrong, between what is distinguished and what is vulgar, and so on, but they are not the same. (17)

Thus it appears that the concepts, field, agent, strategies, trajectories, habitus and symbolic capital, purported by Bourdieu , work hand in hand when it comes to the study of relational networks of all the above elements. A work of art can be better understood with the schema of relational network.

The silent films produced in collaboration with Emelka and Ufa by Himansu Rai thrive on the cultural capital invested in them. Niranjan Pal in his autobiography mentions that he and Himansu Rai did not receive much of economic capital out of Light of Asia. But both of them got recognition in Europe and India (Joshi and Joshi 217-18). Pal mentions:

Encouraged by the success of Light of Asia, a number of Indian princes got interested in forming an Indo-British combine with a capital of one million pound….All of this generated a lot of news in the London press, indirectly aiding Light of Asia with more free publicity.

We were receiving handsome offers from those very distributors who had earlier turned us down with contempt. (Joshi and Joshi 218)

ICCR and ICCE both the documents refer to the Indo-German and Indo-British collaboration in a very positive note. The ICCR in fact go to the extent of calling Himansu Rai as “…the real father of the film, that he is acting in it himself, and is largely responsible for its direction” (ICCR 174). The international collaboration according to the ICCR was also important for the Indian film industry to establish connections with European producers and to learn the craft of film making there.

However there were a few Indian producers who did not approve of the involvement of foreign technicians (ICCE Vol. i 194). The oral evidence of Messrs. N.B Desai, proprietor of Sharada Film Co., A. M. Irani, Proprietor of Imperial Film Co., D. Bhavnani and B. P. Misra, Directors of Imperial Studio expressed their disapproval of the foreign technicians and international collaboration pointing towards the exorbitant fee asked by the foreign technicians. Mr. Bhavanani particularly in his evidence denounces Light of Asia stating “That was not an Indian production. That was a combination of German and Indian…partly foreign capital and partly Indian capital, directed and photographed by foreigners” (ICCE Vol. i 190). Mr. B. P. Misra one of the representatives of the Workers’ Association, in his oral evidence while talking about foreign technicians and Mr. Singh of Oriental Films Ltd., states:

He brought out with him one Mr..Voaraven (?). His wife came as the Star while he was the Camera Man. Mr.Vonr&ven proposed to put the first picture—Shakuntala—on the international market, but when it was produced it turned out to be a complete failure. Better pictures were being produced by the Hindustan Cinema by Mr.Phalke who was not a foreign expert. Foreign experts have been brought in and they could not produce any picture which has had a run in foreign countries. Side by side with pictures produced by our own studios in Bombay, they were failures. Why then should so much credit be given to foreign experts. They are not suited to the industry here. Foreign experts who are real experts won't come out here except on exorbitant salaries. A Director, for instance, won't come for less than Rs.30,000. (195)

He further suggests the need for the Indian young technicians to be trained at German or American institutes for which the government should give scholarships. Interestingly he mentions ‘flying visits’ to Europe. He does not want the young technicians to stay there for longer period of time. Mr. Singh believes “…if they stay there their ideas may be converted into foreign ideas and so when they return to India they will be no use to us” (195). Even if Mr. Singh does not make it clear what exactly he means by training it is safe to assume that he refers to the knowledge of camera and laboratory work. The desire, to keep the Indian sensibilities of the technicians or artists intact, comes out very strongly in Mr.Singh’s statements. Thus the participants like Mr. Bhavanani and Mr. Singh take a certain position in this field of cultural production where importance is given to the indigenous artists producing

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the films. This position is completely opposite to Himansu Rai, Niranjan Pal and Franz Osten’s collaborative efforts. It may appear that the silent films produced with the collaborative efforts were successful and might have proved economically fruitful but for Himansu Rai and Niranjan Pal it proved more to be an investment in the symbolic capital. On the other hand if Madan Theatres Ltd.’s efforts are taken into account, it appears that it was difficult for them to secure the same kind of symbolic capital. Mr. Ardeshir Bilimoria, director of Madan Theatres, in his oral evidence describes his experience with the foreign market:

Q. You said that you made an attempt to secure a foreign market for some of your pictures. In how many instances did you make that attempt?

A. we sent I think two pictures, ‘Nur Jehan’ and ‘Druvacharitra,’ to England and both the pictures were returned.

Q. Only to England or did you try any other country?

A. First we tried in England and we failed. And we took one picture in Italy, ‘Savitri,’ in Rome, by Italian actors.

Q. You got if produced in Italy with the help of Italian actors and actresses?

A. Yes. We took all the dresses and scenario and everything else from here, and it drew very well with the Indian audience in India. (ICCE Vol.i 338)

Madans being in business for substantial amount of time and dominating the distribution part of it were quite well off with the economic profits. Atiya Begum Sahiba, presumably a lady, whose details are not disclosed in the ICCE Vol. i, describes Light of Asia as a better film than Sacrifice which was based on Rabindranath Tagore’s play. The evidence of Atiya Begum Sahiba states:

Q. You talk of Indian productions. Have you seen ‘Sacrifice’?

A. Yes, but first of all I don’t like the story. I don’t want to be personal as all concerned in it are my friends. Frankly speaking, it is very badly produced, it is appalling in all its details.

Q. I thought that it was a good picture?

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A. Even ‘The Light of Asia’, with all its defects, was perhaps a little better than ‘Sacrifice’.

Q. so your objection to the story is that it shows a bad character and not a good character?

A. No. not at all. At the very start, the story is not attractive enough, and then it is badly produced though it ought to have been an improvement over others considering educated and a better class of people were concerned with it. It ought certainly to have been a decided improvement upon the old methods. It was however a very good sequel to Miss Maya’s book. I hope she will write something about the Muhammadans also. If she does not, I should like to write something about them, exposing them as she exposed the Hindus. (ICCE Vol.i 372)

Mr. A. Soares, the Principal of Antonio Desouza High School, Byculla in his Oral Evidence expresses his confusion over the status of Light of Asia as he states “I have seen ‘Sacrifice,’ ‘At the Clang of Fetters’ and ‘The Light of Asia,’ if it can be called an Indian film, because I am told it was produced outside India” (ICCE Vol.i 387). The ICCR terms ‘Sacrifice’ as a successful film for the Indian market but when it comes to exporting this film to Europe for screening it is stated that it “…stands no small chance of winning a place on the screens of Europe although its tragic ending may go against it” (ICCR 173). Light of Asia though is acknowledged as a good film, is not considered Indian. Himansu Rai’s another attempt for international collaboration for Shiraz is disregarded for the major involvement of the foreign producers (ICCR 90). But, whatever disregard Himansu Rai’s films might have attracted, they were an important part of the silent film era of Indian cinema. Himansu Rai and his collaborators occupied an important position in the field of cultural production accumulating symbolic capital through these films, which was to be materialised in the talkie era.

It was not just the producers and exhibitors of cinema who participated in the process of distinctions amongst the films. The audience through their choices participated in the formulation of this field. The audience, according to the ICCR and ICCE Volumes, were divided based on their education and class. The interviewees classify the lower class audience based on their preference for mythological films.

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Bourdieu in his book Distinction states “Taste classifies, and it classifies the classifier. Social subjects, classified by their classifications, distinguish themselves by the distinctions they make, between the beautiful and the ugly, the distinguished and the vulgar, in which their position in the objective classifications is expressed or betrayed” (6). An interesting example of this kind of classification is found in Mr. Walayt Hussain’s evidence. Mr. Walayat Hussain was a student with B.Sc. and M.Sc. degrees. He wishes for the rates of the tickets to be raised so that “…it may not be within the reach of the low class to be able to frequent cinemas” (ICCE Vol. ii 474). The reason for his comments he gives in the written statement is “…low class people are most conspicuous by their presence. This latter class of people frequent cinemas to see somebody kissing or hugging. They have really nothing to do with excellent conclusions which can be derived from the plot. They go back home with pernicious ideas and become more wicked. (474). In the oral evidence he states “As they are ignorant they get an inspiration from the films they see and they may be able to do some wicked deed. I cannot say exactly what would be the effect, and if it is shown for a year I think it will have an evil effect” (477). By illiterate people and low class people Mr. Walayat Hussain means “petty shopkeepers and betel sellers” (477). Howeve Mr. Walayat Hussain associates low class and illiteracy to low caste people as well. In his written statement Mr. Hussain states “Criminally suggestive films have a harmful effect on low-caste people” (475). In the oral evidence while being asked to explain what he means by low-caste people, Mr. Hussain replies:

A. Illiterate people may be either of high family, or they may be-I specify those men who are doing petty jobs, e.g., betel sellers, kahars, etc.,-I take them to be low caste people.

Q. You think that the criminally minded and the immoral form a larger proportion among the low caste people than among the higher caste people? Is that your point?

A. The low class people catch the disease much more easily than the illiterate people of high family. (ICCE Vol. ii 479)

Mr. Hussain further claims that these people’s taste of film suggests that they are immoral people. Mr. E. T. H. Stevenson, Deputy Inspector General of Police in his written statement informs that in Madras the audience of cinema comprises “…all

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classes such as mill hands and labourers of various other industries particularly the Beedi industry. Students of various grades largely attend cinemas” (ICCE Vol. iii 24). He also observes that if the standard of Indian films is increased along the lines of European films even the educated classes would watch the Indian films (ICCE Vol. iii 29). The general impression one gets from the written statements and the oral evidences is that the audience’s taste classifies them. The audience who prefer watching Indian films and western film genres like the crime, adventure and films with incestuous scenes are generally caegorised as illiterate, low class Indian people. The audience watching socials imported from Western countries and America are either Europeans living in India or the high class, elite Indians. The exhibitors in cities like Bombay catered mostly to the urban audience, the Europeans and elite Indians. There were very few cinema halls devoted to Indian films. The exhibitors screened the American and European films not just because of the European and Indian elite’s preference for these films but also because these films could be obtained at low prices and brought in more profits. Himansu Rai’s international collaborations though were made from the orientalist perspective, largely for the western audience, the films acquired a curious position in the cultural field of early Indian silent cinema. These three silent films perform the function of the ‘other’ for the Indian film producers claiming for the authenticity of the Indian artists.

The gradual shift from the mythological to the socials by the producers also focuses on the changing strategies by the producers. The popularity of the adventure films cannot be neglected though there is not much reference to them in the ICCR and ICCE volumes.

Niranjan Pal in his autobiography mentions Himansu Rai reasoning with him for the selection of German technicians for the Bombay Talkies studios. Niranjan Pal recalls:

He was well aware of my feelings against employing western technicians. We sat talking throughout the night when he tried his best to explain why he had hired Germans. He assured me that he was not personally enamoured of them, but to attract the big business magnates of Bombay, this was a necessary ploy. (Joshi and Joshi 234)

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The symbolic capital that Himansu Rai invested in while making the silent films paid off when he formed the Bombay Talkies Ltd. The induction of German technicians in the studio brought in capital necessary to form the studio. However the success of Karma in England also added up to the symbolic capital of Himansu Rai. Devika Rani became the mainstay of the production house. Jawani ki Hawa being the first production of Bombay Talkies Ltd. was a romantic crime thriller. But it was followed by films like Achhut Kanya, Jeevan Naiya and Janmabhoomi which can be easily termed as socials dealing with issues like untouchability, class distinction and social reform. Izzat, Vachan, and Savitri were historical and mythology. By the time Osten had to leave India and Himansu Rai passed away in early 1940, Bombay Talkies Ltd. was back to themes like class distinction through Kangan. All these films also brought in the issues of modernity. The European medicinal practice, hygiene, police, railway, bank were all important elements of the films. Thus it is possible to say that after producing the silent films for the European audience, Himansu Rai changed his strategy and started producing the talkies keeping in mind the language aspect and the audience’s interests. The use of simple Hindi language and simple but effective visual style of the films appears to be a well thought out strategy to attract the audience. Devika Rani’s star status was used to advertise the films. But Baburao Patel the editor of Filmindia in its Vol. 3, Issue No. 8 published in December 1937, criticises Bombay Talkies for its bad publicity tactics. Patel writes:

Good publicity was given to the picture, but some of it was not clever. Bombay Talkies should remember that when they buy expensive space in papers, it should be filled up with some sensible message about the picture. Devika Rani as a draw, has her limits but people come to see Devika in a good story. Tell us something about the story in future. (38)

Along with the themes of the films it was Devika Rani who was used for the advertisements of the films (Figure 2.1). Her being a lady from ‘respectable’ background was certainly cashed on to by Bombay Talkies Ltd. On the other hand Imperial Film Co.’s advertisement of the film Sulochana that appeared in the film magazine The Cinema Vol. 8, Issue No.1 published in November 1933 stands completely opposite to what Bombay Talkies Ltd. practiced in the coming years (Figure 2.2). Imperial Film Co.’s position, calling its films as ‘Swadeshi,’ puts value in its indigenous nature. Pramode Sircar, the Principal of The Art Institute of Film

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Tech. Calcutta, for example while writing in Varieties Weekly, Vol.III, Issue No. 48, published on Saturday, September 2nd 1933, expresses his displeasure regarding young Indian students going to Europe and America to study the art of film making.

Figure 2.1. Advertisement of Jeevan Prabhat by Bombay Talkies Ltd. The advertisement highlights the genre ‘social’ and Devika Rani’s star status. Filmindia, Vol.3,Issue No.8, p.48

Sircar in his write up “The Art of the Film Direction,” states:

Students from India are flocking in the foreign countries to find out a new art to be introduced in their film industry. It is a foolish idea to borrow art from others. It will be neither art nor anything. It will be just like the crow in the garb of a peacock. The art which does not capture the imagination of a people by its distinctiveness does not make any addition to the culture of the people. The art of the direction of the movements of the players in an Indian film cannot be the same as that of the Americans or the English or the Germans or the Russians. It fully depends upon the pure indigenous brain of an artist to

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create a taste among his enthusiasts. Here in India the directors follow the beaten track of the so-called forerunners in America, Germany, and Russia but they always forget that their technicalities in their way of expression are alien to our ideas and our social lives. (19-20)

Thus it appears that the distinction amongst the producers of the films was based on the genres they chose to film and the artists involved in the process of film making. However, some of the films produced by Bombay Talkies Ltd., were praised for their technical superiority in thier reviews. Josef Wirsching’s camera work, Franz Osten’s direction skills and Saraswati Devi’s music is highlighted in the film reviews.

K.A. Abbas and Baburao Patel as film critics did try to shape the taste of the audience in the 1930s. Their reviews of the films and the critical articles disregard the adventure films like Hunterwali (1935), Miss Frontier Mail (1936), Lootaru Lalna (1938) and Rangeela Mazdur (1938) produced by Wadia Movietone. In Filmindia Vol. 3, Issue. 12, published in April 1938 the section “Howlers of the Month,” Baburao Patel mockingly describes J.B.H. Wadia’s preference for the stunt films. Patel states “They say that J.B. H. Wadia almost fainted after seeing ‘Sougadi’ a Nataraj picture. A ‘Stunt King’ cannot stand quality so easily” (34). Wadia Movietone advertised their films by focusing on Nadia’s star status and the genre they dealt in; the stunt (Figure 2.3). Soungadi dealt with social theme and was popular amongst the audience (Filmindia Vol. 3, Issue. 12 55). K.A. Abbas in his article “An Eventful Year,” published in Filmindia Vol.5, Issue No. 12 December 1939, praises the efforts of Wadia Movietone of adding some social elements in their films. Abbas states:

Throughout the year I have noticed this sense of increased sobriety and responsibility in a variety of ways which have left no doubt in my mind, that slowly, painfully, reluctantly but inevitably, the Indian producers are being forced by the cultural awakening in the country and the quickening of the national pulse to come closer to life’s realities and to bring to bear on their films at least a sham semblance of seriousness. That even stunt films have titles such as ‘Jai Swadesh’ and ‘Rangila Mazdur’ and often depict the hero or heroine to be champions of the poor, that Wadia’s undertook an expensive experiment in ‘Kahan Hai Manzil Teri’…(44)

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In the same article K. A. Abbas talks about the progress in the technical aspect of the films. He particularly mentions the three big studios, New Theatres, Prabhat and Bombay Talkies. Abbas states:

Turning from the sociological content of pictures to their technical aspects, I think the year 1939 has witnessed almost a revolution in the technical standards of average Indian pictures. New Theatres, Prabhat and Bombay Talkies were already well-known for their excellent technique through the daring experiments in montage and symbolism tried in ‘Admi’ are a challenge even to these studios. But what is more important is that other studios also are now devoting considerable attention to improved cinematography. (44-45)

Abbas mentions that Bombay Talkies studio was always better than other studios in the processing department. Bombay Talkies, according to Abbas, but lacks in the photography department. Bhabi, Durga and Kangan, because of their technical superiority and performances by Devika Rani and Leela Chitnis, are considered to be good films (45). Abbas while comparing the progress of New Theatres, Prabhat and Bombay Talkies mentions:

Bombay Talkies maintained their usual level-neither dropping down nor reaching newer heights-, New Theatres definitely came down from their previous eminence (the only redeeming feature being ‘Bari Didi’). Prabhat who were in danger of a deterrioration after ‘My Son’ once again went to the top with Shantaram’s ‘Admi’. (46)

As Debashree Mukherjee argues “The emerging figure of the film critic is pivotal to understanding the terrain of motivations that informed film journalism during these years. A new type of urban professional, the film critic self-consciously promoted cinema as art, industry, and social document, thereby creating a valid space for the movies in everyday public consideration” (Creating Cinema’s Reading Public 166) K. A. Abbas and Baburao Patel through their film journalism played an important role in legitimizing certain kind of viewership. Both of them through their critical articles on films seem to shape the taste of the audience in the 1930s. This becomes evident when one looks at the advertisements of the films, readers’ comments on them, and their reviews in relational mode. The advertisements are full of positives of the films where as the film reviews and critical articles show the problems with the films and

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suggest what should be done to produce a good film. A certain section of the audience in the 1930s becomes visible through the special sections in the film magazines devoted for the exchange of views through letters.

Figure 2.2. Wadia Movietone’s advertisement of Lootaroo Lalna, focusing on its star Nadia and the genre Stunt film. (Filmindia Vol. 3, Issue. 12 April 1938, p.51)

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Filmindia contains special section “The Editor’s Mail,” contains the reactions of the audience on various issues. To begin with, several correspondents are seen asking about personal life of the film actresses. Mr. S. N. from Patna in Filmindia Vol. 3, Issue. No. 10, published in February 1938 is answered by the editor Baburao Patel:

Q. Do you think ‘Seeta’ and ‘Savitri’ to be failures?

A. The first one was a commercial failure. The second one did not prove a great success as was expected.

Q. Who is the greatest character actor of India?

A. Mr. Baburao Pendharkar. Very few people can reach the heights of this man in a costume role.

Q. Whom do you think to be the most beautiful actress of India?

A. If the word ‘beautiful’ is to embrace ‘personality’ in addition to physical charms, then Devika Rani is easily the best. (22)

The question about Devika Rani shows the curiosity and interest of the reader into the life of a ‘star’ but the other two queries reflect on the critical thinking of the reader towards the film culture. Two more readers come across in the same issue who ask questions about Devika Rani. One P.L.N.R is seen interested in knowing whether Ashok Kumar is related to Devika Rani in any way and the editor answers in positive but ending with comic note denying any disclosure of the form of relationship (18). S.J from Pudukotta asks about the best film of Devika Rani and the editor replies that her best is yet to be delivered (18). There were, interestingly, letters from places as remote as Nandurbar, which is still considered to be a tribal district in the north side of Maharashtra. B.M.P’s enquiry and Patel’s reply goes in the following way:

Q. Seven years I have been working as the manager of a cinema but now I want to better my prospect by joining a firm of distributors. Can you suggest something?

A. I approve of your ambition. Your experience as an exhibitor will be useful to some clever distributor who is anxious to know some secrets of upcountry exhibition. I suggest your writing to Seth Chunilal Desai, Lamington Raod,

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Bombay, and I am sure he will straightway give you a traveller’s job to go with his films. Seth Chunilal happens to be one of the foremost distributors who have shown rare acumen of business in piloting successful ventures. Being soft hearted, he doesn’t refuse anyone anything-even money. (22)

Patel’s readiness to answer and guide the readers is seen in some other instances where he asks the enquirers to join the Abdulla Fazalbhoy Technical Institute. Most of the male audience appear to be interested in obtaining the actresses’ photographs and addresses. We get a glimpse of the fan culture as early as 1930s in India. Paluri Ranga Rao from Kurnool in Filmindia, Vol.3, Issue. No. 11, published in March 1938, wishes to act in the films and asks the editor:

Q. In your December Editorial, referring to ‘Devika Rani,' you have expressed your pity that one of the sweetest girls of the screen should not get a suitable hero. This you have repeated at several places wherever there was an opportunity, so much so, that I am touched to the quick. In me, I assure you, the world can find the most able actor and I do not want to deny one to the world and at the same time deny myself the pleasure of dealing with sweet Devika on the screen. So please let me know if the Directors of Bombay Talkies Ltd., will be in a position to accept my services.

A. Your name doesn't sound very romantic. Anyway if you are one tenth of what you say then take a ticket for Bombay and present yourself before Himansu Rai and give him a chance to size you up. Remember that Devika is the "forbidden apple" of the Bombay Talkies Studio. (23)

The readers were also interested in knowing the reasons for which certain production houses were successful. In the same issue of Filmindia S. Lal Perti from Lucknow enquires about the causes for the success of New Theatres and Prabhat. Patel replies:

In case of New Theatres, success is more due to the team play between a number of technicians and directors, not to mention a wonderful batch of artistes. In case of Prabhat, success is more due to clever commercial organisation of all affairs right from the conception of the story to its legitimate run on the screen. Sincerity of purpose and the desire to serve art are attributes common to both the companies.

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While reviewing the film Mother India produced by India Cine Pictures Ltd., Baburao Patel in Filmindia, Vol. 5, Issue No. 3 published in March 1939, writes:

This machine becomes the sole support of Sabita’s future existence. Through years she toils, till one day her son, Nandkumar, becomes a barrister and Bindu, Kailash’s daughter, becomes an attractive grown up maiden. Here modernity steps in and inspite of the wishes of his mother, Nandkumar decides to marry Nalini, the daughter of Mahendra. (35)

By modernity in the above quotation Patel means the freedom of choice. The male character in the review of the film makes his own choice for his object of desire. Thus along with the industrialisation the practice of personal choice is also considered to be a sign of modernity. In the same way the readers of Filmindia writing to the editor try to practice their critical faculties when they ask questions about various production houses and their films. Some of them even get into the arguments with the editor. Walter Benjamin points out this quality of cinema as an art. Benjamin in his essay “Art in the Age of Mechanical Reproducibility,” while talking about cinema as an art states:

The technological reproducibility of the artwork changes the relation of the masses to art. The extremely backward attitude toward a Picasso painting changes into a highly progressive reaction to a Chaplin film. The progressive attitude is characterized by an immediate, intimate fusion of pleasure-pleasure in seeing and experiencing-with an attitude of expert appraisal. Such a fusion is an important social index. (The Work of Art in the Age of Its Technological Reproducibility, and Other Writings on Media 36)

For the film audience to write in the film magazine did not need any particular kind of training in the analysis of the films. The only condition probably was being literate; being capable of writing. Film journalism in the 1930s did not just advertise and reviewed films; it also tried to shape the film viewing practice of the readers. The film journals became a platform for the readers to participate in the field of cultural production and practice distinctions through their letters to the editors. Rajeev Bhargava in the introduction to Civil society, public sphere and citizenship discusses the status of modernity in India. Bhargava lists some of the features with which modernity can be identified. Bhargava states:

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(a) The acceptance of some degree of disenchantment with nature. (b) A marked tendency to avoid suffering and desire material well-being. (c) The adoption of different principles for the self-identification of individuals and the groups to which they belong and therefore the generation of new types of collective and individual identities whose relationship entailed some form of freedom for individuals. (d) Some form of equality among individuals and groups. (e) The acceptance that differences among individuals and groups are inevitable and reasonable. Points b, d and perhaps e together constitute the modern idea of social justice. (f) The presence of some degree of reflexivity and therefore critical questioning. (g) And, finally, the belief that at least to some extent social structures depend on human agency.

Together these features secrete or presuppose a certain conception of the self and how it relates to other selves and to the natural world. (29)

The analysis, of the sound films produced by Bombay Talkies, would shed some light on the issues of modernity in the films. But before the technical analysis of sound films is undertaken the analysis of the three silent films produced by Himansu Rai with international collaboration should be attempted. The next chapter contains analysis of Light of Asia, Shiraz and A Throw of Dice.

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