Photography Reimagining History The newly discovered visual archives of Kulwant Roy shed light on Independence-era India Kristen V Brown here are stories of Kulwant of a clash of ego.” later, in December 2007, Arya Roy, his spirit broken, spend- Little did Arya know he would decided enough was enough – it was T ing the last years of his life eventually spend years tracking time to open the boxes. “I knew that hunting through Delhi’s post offices Roy’s ghosts. once I opened them, there would be and garbage dumps for his lost The industry Roy had first no time. There would be no looking work. The images, photographed become enamoured with had long back,” says Arya. during a global trek that would last since vanished by the time of his He had an inkling that what he the first three years of the 1960s, death – a new era of aggressive had been hiding away in the dusty had been shipped from stops along young photojournalists had taken corners of an upper story guest bed- the way to his home in Mori Gate. over the industry. Gone were the room was important. The images, He returned to India in 1963; he days when press enjoyed easy access which number well above 10,000, learned the boxes had never and chummy relationships with sprawled across the entirety of the reached. politicians. bedroom. Neatly collected in Aditya Arya remembers this Roy Developing leukaemia later in envelopes and boxes with labels like – a depressed, jaded bachelor – as a life, Roy would die broke, alone and “Muslim League photos,” some of daily fixture at the dinner table. An unnoticed, disenchanted by the pas- the negatives had become brittle, old family friend, Arya’s mother sion that once took him around the some were stuck together, weath- insisted Roy took one meal a day at world. All that remained of his work ered over years and years of storage their household, during which he was bit by bit left with Arya leading clumped together, often in high sometimes reminisced on his days up to his final days, carefully stuffed humidity. as an Indian press photographer, into boxes, envelopes, and two But what had survived intact of chronicling some of infant India’s medium-sized canary yellow trunks. Roy’s portfolio were the priceless, most important moments. But by “He started coming home and rare images of India’s birth: Nehru, the time Arya was old enough to leaving his stuff slowly with me,” Gandhi, Sardar Patel. Roy’s pho- remember him, Roy had, for the says Arya. “He told me: ‘There are tographs were the photographic evi- most part, hung up his camera. important pictures in there.’” dence of history in the making. Depressed his life’s work had van- The boxes were promptly stashed ished, he seldom shared the images in corners and closets and forgotten oy found his way to Lahore that remained. about. They followed Arya to three after a childhood in It was later, when Arya expressed different flats, untouched as he RBaglikalan in Ludhiana, an interest in photography, spend- struggled to break into the photog- Punjab. There he met Raj Gopal, ing his post-college summer occa- raphy business. He first worked in Arya’s great uncle, who ran a photo sionally working with Roy in his lab, Bollywood’s art film industry, even- studio called Gopal Chitra Kutter that Roy discouraged him. tually becoming a successful com- studios. Gopal taught Roy photogra- Photography had become just a mercial photographer and travelling phy, and Roy was hooked. In 1941, passing hobby for Roy, no longer a the world, as Roy once had, shooting he joined the Royal Indian Air Force source of passion or income. for high-paying clients like Oberoi. as aerial photographer, but it was “He was adamant that I should The boxes sat, neglected – Arya too not long before he became disen- not be a photographer,” recalls Arya busy with his own career to spend chanted with the way Indians were of the man whose past would haunt the time mulling over someone treated in the British establishment. his future, “but I was convinced that else’s. “Indians were only allowed to use I would make it one day. It was a bit Nearly a quarter of a century the swimming pool on Sunday, 54 The Caravan, February 16-28, 2009 All Archive images Arya courtesy Aditya the Top left: Gandhi at a railway station in the early 40s, riding in third class. Top right: Nehru at a railway station in the early 40s. Bottom: Nehru, Gandhi and Sardar Patel at a special meeting of the All India Congress in 1946 to discuss an interim government. The Caravan, February 16-28, 2009 55 The Arts because on Monday they changed the water,” explains Arya. “These guys went and revolted.” A fed up Roy left the Air Force, and refocused his lens. In the mid-40s, he joined another of Arya’s great-uncles, Gopal’s brother Lalit, in Delhi. They set up Associated Press Photos in Mori Gate; Roy went on to capture some of the most important events of Independence-era India. Roy had emerged as a press pho- tographer in the 1930s just as new- camera technology was allowing pho- tographers to leave the studio, and come out onto the street. Cameras like the Speed Graphic, Rolleiflex, and Leica – Roy’s personal choice – were portable. Then entered India’s first photographic press corps. In the 40s and the 50s, Roy chron- icled Muslim League meetings, the visit of Sir Stafford Cripps to India in 1942, and the building of the Bhakra Dam. He trailed Gandhi and Nehru. He caught on film a heated argument between Gandhi and Mohammed Ali Jinnah, a rare image as the two were rarely seen in the same room togeth- er. Roy sold many of his images to news agencies around the world – the photo of Gandhi and Jinnah appears in the archives of Getty Images, one of All Archive images Arya courtesy Aditya the the world’s largest photo agencies. The photograph is attributed, simply, to a “stringer.” Often times, photogra- phers of this era went uncredited, unaware of the importance of their images or the times they were docu- menting. As a young boy, and budding pho- tographer, Arya saw little if any of Roy’s work. “He was very vague,” says Arya. “If I had known I would have Kulwant Roy in Japan in 1961. asked him lots more questions and very important. There is no such col- are so historically significant: probably documented him. lection,” says Arya. “People want to “These images give a lot of insight Sometimes photographers are like buy them, and I say take your money the leaders of the Indian national historians.” and get out. I’ve known this guy all movement, and the relationship His role in Arya’s life was that of my life, it’s not like I can just sell between various political leaders. an eclectic uncle, rather than a men- them.” Like the photograph of Gandhi and tor in photography. But the images Indivar Kamtekar, a professor of Jinnah, you can tell more from their Roy had captured earlier in his life 20th-century Indian history at body language than you can from were some of the most important Jawaharlal Nehru University who is correspondence. They do not say images of their time. collaborating on a book about the something that is not completely “Historically, these images are collection, explains why the images unavailable in the text, but they sup- 56 The Caravan, February 16-28, 2009 The Arts All Archive images Arya courtesy Aditya the Aditya Arya and the mess when he first opened Roy’s boxes. plement the text. You could read now a sort of hectic museum of Roy’s “The idea is to create a huge data- entire volume to get the insight which work – Arya pulls out another folder, base, as well as information, and one image gives you.” containing letters from a Japanese resource material on him. We’ve had The images left behind by the lover, newspaper clippings, taped to great revelations about how he press photographers, the ones that sheets of paper, pronouncing the worked. He was an amazing, enter- have never seen much light of day, death of old photographer friends, prising guy.” are invaluable sources years later. and copies of the newspapers and A year and a half after first open- “There are photographs of Gandhi magazines from around the world ing the box, Arya’s two hired assis- and Nehru which I haven’t actually where Roy’s work appeared. tants work full time, six days a week, seen in newspaper print. We don’t Since uncovering the contents of scanning the thousands of images on have a good collection of 20th centu- his inheritance, Arya – a self four scanners in his Gurgaon office. ry images, especially the mid 20th described history nerd, who graduat- They have been scanning now since century. Roy was one of a group of ed from Delhi University with a the discovery in 2007 and anticipate press photographers, but most of degree in the subject – has embarked finishing in a month or so, in time to them have perished, most of their upon a detective mission of sorts, launch the book for Independence collections are lost. This collection is tracking down old contemporaries of Day. extraordinarily rich.” Roy’s, attempting to piece together For the first few months after his the life that Roy led before he hung discovery, Arya attempted to keep his n a cluttered office at the top of up his camera and became the soli- incredible findings under wraps.