With which did film realism in Indian cinema begin? Can this film be better termed as the first of its genre in South Asia? And hence, one of the most original movies of the Asian continent? Answers may vary and arguments may crop up. But the screening of the very first Assamese feature film Joymoti in a film festival held in Stuttgart, Germany and the appreciation that followed were enough to provide a convincing answer to these queries. That it’s maker Jyotiprasad Agarwalla was the doyen of modern Assamese music and drama was another fact. His film was based on Lakshminath Bezbaruah’s play Joymoti Konwari. Yet, due to his vision and understanding of the medium, cinema in Assam was born as most authentic and original.

At a time when almost all the film-makers in British-ruled India relied largely on mythologies and the making leaned heavily towards the theatrical ways, Jyotiprasad was the odd man out. He deviated from traditional and dominant ways of film-making of those days. Realism in Indian cinema is said to have started with Satyajit Ray’s all-time-great Pathar Panchali (1955). However, the festival of films packaged as ‘Bollywood and Beyond’ held in Stuttgart on July 12-17, 2006 had a different citation to say. Its website www.filmbuerobw.de observed : ‘the first movie production from Assam is also the first movie about Indian realism. Joymoti, released in 1935, added a new chapter in the chronicles of Indian cinema.’ The Stuttgart show had further fulfilled Jyotiprasad’s dream of a world premiere of his debut film.

Prior to the release of Joymoti there were 612 talkies made in the country, starting with Ardeshir Irani’s Alam Ara (1931). But not a single one had realistic treatment of the storyline. Jyotiprasad avoided all the compulsions for making heroics out of a 17th century legend of a princess of the Ahom dynasty who died of the torture meted out by a puppet king and his coterie. Even in the face of death, she did not utter a single word about her husband Godapani’s hideout, thereby protecting the future of the kingdom and the people. The director, equipped with such a theme, could have gone for overtly inane sentimentality, so to say; but he did not. His resolution was that film acting, unlike stage acting, as well as the situations enacted, should be natural. He confessed that as far as directing and acting were concerned, he was deeply inspired by English and Russian films.

The second most striking aspect of the film was an unmistaken political correctness seen in a period film. Even before going abroad to undertake studies, Jyotiprasad was declared as absconding by the administration and later arrested twice for his active role in the non-cooperation movement led by Mahatma Gandhi. Joymoti actually symbolised the nonviolent resistance of people against the tyranny of the ruler. It was a film of protest, the young princess representing mass disapproval of a tyrannical king. None of his contemporaries in celluloid dared to take a dig,– however symbolic, indirect and draped in historical facts,– at the colonial rulers. Thus, the most uncommon attribute of Joymoti should make Jyotiprasad recognised as the first politically conscious film-maker in the history of Indian cinema. He was the only political film-maker in the pre-independent India, a characteristic that was traced in the post-independence period from Ritwik Ghatak onwards.

The third most important achievement of Joymoti was its exploits of the historical and traditional nuances peculiar to Assam. Till then, Indian film-makers were largely dependent on religious and mythological themes. But Jyotiprasad not only recreated a very crucial period in the lives of Assamese people, but also the turmoil gripping the 17th century Ahom kingdom. He took genuine and painstaking efforts to utilise specific Assamese speech-patterns, local idioms; even took into account various religious scripts, myths and legends, consulted eminent persons including those who were closely associated with the Satras – the Vaisnavite sanctuaries, to create his sets and social milieu. These details came in for instant praise by no less a person than the legendary film-maker Pramathesh Barua. The literary giant Lakshminath Bezbaruah also observed that Joymoti was quite free from the influences of the dominating Bangla films, popular theatres like Jatra etc.

And fourthly, Joymoti was probably the very first attempt by any Indian director to depict the narratives in true feminist colour, – a fact which was overlooked by critics and historians. The uncompromising resistance shown by Joymoti, Rajmao, Seuti and other ladies seemed to have overshadowed their menfolk. In the Thirties the women protagonists in Indian cinema were very passive, always sidelined.

There is no doubt that the ‘regional realism’ was the result of a very conscious effort in the film. Only because of our failure to project it in the national perspective, this masterpiece has been deprived of its true evaluation in the annals of film history. Originally the film was more than two hours long in duration. However, the original prints were lost and Hridayananda Agarwala, the youngest brother of Jyotiprasad, was able to trace only seven reels. The footage was incorporated in Dr. Bhupen Hazarika’s documentary Rupkonwar Jyotiprasad Aru Joymoti (1976), but the original sequences were not in order while several portions had the editor’s touch on them with background voice-over. Still, we’re fortunate to have a dedicated soul in the critic-turned-film-maker Altaf Mazid who re-arranged the sequences. But this new version in DVD, with English sub-titles, could run upto 57 minutes only. Here it is worth remembering that the first Indian movie Raja Harishchandra’s prints were also lost; but a few minutes of its footage were somehow found and that was just enough to establish its historical significance.

It needs no elaboration why some classic movies of yesteryears need to be restored. Hitherto neglected, their significance is reinvented. The world’s top film festivals always look for such movies. Last year I was quite amazed to see the restored films by Chaplin, Bresson, Bunuel and Antonioni among others at the 49th The Times bfi London Film Festival. As a matter of fact, when Joymoti’s DVD was sent to Cannes, the festival organisers asked for a digitally corrected version. However, the authorities in Stuttgart were benevolent enough to ask for the simple DVD. A ‘digitally correct’ film of 60 minutes needs not less than Rs. 25 lakhs. Is there anybody to bear this cost and enable Altaf Mazid to give a finishing touch to his noble effort? What about the state government, which could boast of having two of its representatives, including the Minister of Cultural Affairs, present in Stuttgart? Can not the government produce at least CDs and DVDs of Joymoti for general viewers? Who knows, London will perhaps have a special screening of Joymoti? That will be another welcome step forward, because Jyotiprasad spent three crucial years of learning Western music in Edinburgh University and simultaneously getting accustomed to the new experiments by the celluloid masters.

It is not to be forgotten either that Germany was the land where Jyotiprasad spent seven months after returning from England. Incidentally, he happened to meet Himangshu Rai who had by then established his own company in Germany. With Rai’s recommendation, he got an entry into the famous UFA studio in Berlin and used every opportunity to learn the craft of film-making in a practical way. Roi paid more attention to international production while Jyotiprasad was more conscious about attaining international standards. The duo set up their own studios, both in 1934 – Rai his Bombay Talkies in Mumbai and Jyotiprasad his Chitraban, a makeshift studio in Bholaguri tea estate near Gohpur. The rest was the history that needed re-evaluation.

Courtesy: The Assam Tribune (September 2006)