The Great Indian films' Listing at the Library of Congress,Washington

Govind Nilhani

Rajkapoor for a social cause

Ritwik's Soul of Bangla - Bangabala in Jukti Takko Goppo

Bengal Famine of 1943 where 30 million lost lives

Mrinal Sen

Ritwik's Meghe Dhaka tara

About India and Indian films

In early twentieth century, dawn of of new art form emerged - filming as a form of expression of human mind and thoughts. Film narrate a story. Film spread a thought  and wants to make you think and in the process engage with the audience and lift the awareness of being about his or her surrounding.

A film that like a novel or a piece of painting, could become a timeless piece of  art when it could capture the essence of humanity that transcends time and society and ask humanity to practice that essence of living - universal love beyond blood relations, universal human struggle for survival against all odds, wisdom of equality and natural justice and a concern for fellow being's welfare.

Here are a list of treasure troves that LoC compiled - here the doyens of film making huddle with each other in a inviting List that has been constructed by LoC with utmost care and impartiality. You will find Govind Nilhani, Satyajit Ray, Ritwik Ghatak, Raj Kapoor , Mrinal Sen, Santaram, Bimal Roy and so many distinguished other film makers together. 

Going through the list, I wonder that many of  these films I have not seen before but now I wish that these would be collectors list for family keep.

Enjoy reading the list and rediscover Indian society through the ears and eyes of these great film artists.

Source:http://www.loc.gov/rr/mopic/findaid/india.html

About LoC

The Library of Congress began collecting motion pictures in 1893 when Thomas Edison and his brilliant assistant W.K.L. Dickson deposited the Edison Kinetoscopic Records for copyright. However, because of the difficulty of safely storing the flammable nitrate film used at the time, the Library retained only the descriptive material relating to motion pictures. In 1942, recognizing the importance of motion pictures and the need to preserve them as a historical record, the Library began the collection of the films themselves. From 1949 on these included films made for television. Today the Motion Picture, Broadcasting and Recorded Sound Division (MBRS) has responsibility for the acquisition, cataloging and preservation of the motion picture and television collections. The Division operates the Motion Picture and Television Reading Room to provide access and information services to an international community of film and television professionals, archivists, scholars and researchers.

Location:
101 Independence Ave. SE
James Madison Building, LM 336
Washington, D.C. 20540-4690

Introduction

One of the richest and most interesting collections in the Motion Picture, Broadcasting and Recorded Sound Division of the Library of Congress is the ninety feature films and one hundred short films that make up the Indian Film Collection. While this Division has several outstanding collections of foreign film, the Indian collection is unique because it represents the aesthetic choice of a group of experts in Indian film, the best known being Erik Barnouw. Dr. Barnouw was Chief of this Division from 1979 to 1981. He had long been interested in Indian film, and had co-authored one of the first books written on the subject outside India [Erik Barnouw and S. Krishnaswamy, Indian Film (New York, Oxford, New Delhi: Oxford University Press, 1963)].
But in the Library of Congress, interest alone does not produce a collection. Instrumental in obtaining these films were Paul Spehr, the Assistant Chief of this Division, who became an expert in Indian film in his own right, and Gene Smith of the New Delhi Office of the Overseas Operations Division of the Library, who are passionately interested in obtaining the best possible films and videos from India for our collection. The Library has also benefitted from the recommendations of a number of Indian film scholars. The former director of the National Film Archive of India in Poona, P. K. Nair compiled a list of recommended titles which were an invaluable guide. Mr. Nair's recommendations supplemented those of Daniel Sauri of the Library's office in New Delhi. The respected film critic Chidananda Das Gupta provided sage analysis of both recommendations and made several worthwhile additions. The publications of the Calcutta Film Society Chitrabani, directed by Father Gaston Roberge were a cornerstone of documentation of serious cinema in India. Negotiations and purchase of prints was arranged by Anil Srivastava of Cendit, who worked closely with the National Film Archive to locate films for the Library. Thanks are also due to Alice Knistern, who is obtaining new films and videos for the Library. In putting this collection together, the Library was also extremely fortunate in being able to make use of the Special Foreign Purchase fund. We can only hope that this Foreign Purchase Fund does not come to an end, so that we can continue to enrich this marvelous collection.
Experts in Indian film will quickly notice that many of these films represent the best of what has been called in India parallel cinema or new cinema; the attempt to produce an intellectual, socially committed body of film in opposition to the immensely powerful commercial cinema of India. There are three films by Mrinal Sen, sixteen by Satajit Ray and five by Ritwak Ghatak. However, there are also many films from the Bombay Talkies era, a devotional film (Sant Tukuram) as well as a film featuring the bullwhip-cracking Fearless Nadia (Diamond Queen), and the epic music and dance film Chandralekha. The serious scholar should be able to find all sorts of film in this collection.
A few words of caution. Most of these films are in the original language and are not subtitled in English. The numbers in the upper right corners of the page (e.g. FBC 1200-1202) are our shelf numbers. In some cases, films have not been processed, in which case the number will be an arrearage number, such as 21C. In this case, there will be a delay of several weeks at least before the researcher can see the film.
In addition, this is a selected list of Indian films in the Library. The researcher should remember that the Library is constantly receiving films and video. For instance, the Library is starting to receive Indian features on 1/2" videocassette through Copyright deposit which are not yet on this list. If you have any questions, please telephone a reference librarian at (202) 707-8572, or write to:
Cooper C. Graham, May 1992

List of Films

1.22 JUNE 1897 21B 1980.Producer: Nachiket Jayoo Release and Production.  Directors: Nachiket and Jayoo Patwardhan.  Photography: Navrose Contractor.  Music: Anand Modak. 35mm, color.

2.AAKROSH  (Cry of the Wounded)FCB 0079-0082 1980.  Producer: Krana Movies Enterprises.  Director: Govind Nihalani.  Script: Vijay Tendulkar.  Cast: Naseeruddin Shah, Smita Palil, Smtidh Puri, Om Puri, Arvind Deshpoande, Mohan Agashe. 16mm, color, 144 min.  Language: Hindi with English subtitles.

3.ACHHUT KANYA (The Untouchable)FEB 8055-8068 1936.  Producer: Bombay Talkies.  Director: Franz Osten.  Story: Himansu Rai.  Script: Niranjan Pal.  Photography: Josef Wirsching.  Music: Saraswati Devi.  Cast: Ashok Kumar, Devika Rani, P. F. Pithavala, Kamta Prasad, Kishori Lal, Mukherjee, Mumtaz Ali, Sunita Devi, Chandraprabha.  35mm, b&w.  Language: Hindi.

4.AJANTRIK (Pathetic Fallacy) (Mechanical Man) 21E

1958.  Producer: L&B Films International.  Director: Ritwak Ghatak. 

Story: Subodh Ghosh.  Script: Ritwak Ghatak.  Photography: Dinen Gupta.

Music: Ali Akbar Khan.  Cast: Kali Banerjee, Gyanesh Mukherjee, Satindra Bhattacharya, Gangapada Basu, Tulsi Chakravarty, Dipak, Anil Chatterjee, Kajal Gupta, Sita Mukherjee. 35mm, b&w.  Language: Bengali

5.ALBERT PINTO KO GUSSA KYON AATA HAI 28F (What Makes Albert Pinto Angry) 1980.  Producer: Saeed Akhtar Productions.  Director: Saeed Akhtar Mirza.  Script: Kundan Shah and Saeed Akhtar Mirza.  Photography: Virendra Saini.  Music: Bhaskar Chandravarkar.  Cast: Naseeruddin Shah, Shabana Azmi, Smita Palil, Dilip Dhawan, Sulabha Deshpande, Arvind Deshpande, Om Puri.  16mm, b&w.  Language: Hindi.

6.ANJAN FEB 8108-8121 1941.  Producer.  Bombay Talkies.  Director: Amiya Chakrabarty. Music: Pannalal Ghosh.  Cast:  Devika Rani, Ashok Kumar, V. H. Desai, Girish, Suresh, Pithivala, Gulab, David, Turun Kumar, Arun Kumar, Dixit, Om Prakash.  35mm, b&w.  Language: Hindi.  

7.APARJITO (The Unvanquished) FCA 5796-5798 1956.  Producer: Epic Films.  Director: Satyajit Ray.  Story: Bibhutibhusan Banerjee.  Script: Satyajit Ray.  Photography: Subrata Mitra.  Music: Ravi Shankar.  Cast: Karuna Banerjee, Kanu Banerjee, Pinake Sengupta, Smaran Ghosal, Charuprakesh Ghosh, Subodh Ganguly. Ramani Sengupta, Kalicharan Roy, Sudipta Roy, Shanti Gupta, Ajay Mitra, Ranibala Dev.  16mm, b&w.  Language: Bengali

8.ARANYER DIN RATRI (Days and Nights in the Forest)FCA 8222-8224

1970.  Producer: Priya Films.  Director: Satyajit Ray.  Story: Sunil

Ganguly.  Script: Satyajit Ray.  Music: Satyajit Ray.  Photography:

Soumendu Roy.  Cast: Soumitra Chatterjee, Sharmila Tagore, Subhendu

Chatterjee, Samit Bhanja, Rabi Ghosh, Simi, Pahari Samyal, Kaberi Basu,

Aparna Sen, Premashish Sen, Samar Nag, Nani Ganguly, Dibyendu Chatterjee.  16mm, b&w.  Language: Bengali.

9.ARDH SATYA  21B 1983.  Producer: Manmohan Shetty and Pradeep Upoor.  Director: Govind Nihalani.  Script: Vijay Tendulkar. Photography: Govind Nihalani. Music:  Ajit Verman.  Cast: Om Puri, Smita Patil, Amrish Puri, Naseeruddin Shah.  35mm, color.  Language: Hindi.

10.ASHANI SANKET (Distant Thunder) FCB 2244-2246 1973. Producer: Sarbani Bhattacharyya.  Director: Satyajit Ray. Story: Bibhuti Bhusan Banerjee.  Script: Satyajit Ray.  Music: Satyajit Ray.  Cast: Soumitra Chatterjee, Babita, Sandhya Roy, Gobinda Chakrabartyt, Ramesh Mukherjee, Sheli Pal.  16mm, color.  Language: Bengali with English subtitles.

This film was not bought in India through the foreign purchase fund.

11.ATITHI 17F 1965.  Producer: New Theatres.  Director: Tapan Sinha.  Story: Rabindranath Tagore.  Script: Tapan Sinha.  Music. Tapan Sinha.  Cast: Parthasarathi Mukherjee, Salil Dutta, Soumen Mukherjee, Bankim Ghosh, Ajitesh Banerjee, Benoy Lahiri, Rasaraj Chakrabarty.  16mm, b&w. 

Language: Bengali.

12.AVVAIYYAR FEC 1318-1335 1953.  Gemini Studios Ltd.  Director: K. Subbhu.  Story: K. Subbhu. Script: K. Subbhu.  Music: M. D. Parthasarathy and others.  Cast: K. B. Sundarambal, Kusula Kumari, G. Pattu Iyer.  35mm, b&w, 184 min.  Language: Tamil.

13.AWARA  FCA 8217-8221 1951.  R.K. Films.  Producer: Raj Kapoor.  Director: Raj Kapoor.  Story: K. A. Abbas, V. P. Sathe.  Script: K. A. Abbas.  Photography: Radhu Karmakar. Music: Shanker Jaikishan.  Cast: Prithviraj, Raj Kapoor, K. N. Singh, Nargis, Shashiraj, Leela Misra, B. M. Vyas, Leela Chitnis. Released in the U. S. under the title THE VAGABOND.  LC copy has English language credits; main title is in Roman alphabet.  16mm, b&w. Language: Hindi.

14.BANDHAN FCA 9465-9468 1940.  Producer: Bombay Talkies.  Director: N. R. Acharya.  Music: Saraswati Devi and Ramchandra Pal.  Cast: Leela Chitnis, Ashok Kumar, V. H. Desai, P. F. Pithivala, Shah Nawaz, Suresh, Arun Kumar.  16mm, b&w. Language: Hindi.

15.BARI THEKYE PALIYE (The Runaway) 21D 1959.  Producer: L&B Films International.  Director: Ritwak Ghatak.  Story: Shibram Chavravarty.  Script: Ritwak Ghatak.  Photography: Dinen Gupta.  Music: Salil Chowdhury.  Cast: Param Bhattarak Lahiri, Padma Devi, Shailen Ghosh, Gyanesh Mukherjee, Dipak, Kali Banerjee, Keshto Mukherjee, Mani Srimani, Jahar Roy, Krishnajaya, Satindra Bhattacharya, Mohammed Israel, Sita Mukherjee, Bijon Bhattacharya.  35mm, b&w, 123 min.

Language: Bengali

16.BASANT FCA 9469-9472 1942.  Producer:  Bombay Talkies.  Director: Amiya Chakrabarty. Music: Pannalal Ghosh.  Cast: Mumtaz Shanti, Ulhas, Pramila, Suresh, Mumtaz Ali, Pithavala, Jagannathm Kanu Roy, Ganju, Baby Mumtaz.  b&w,16mm.

17.BHABHI FCA 9492-9495 1938.  Producer: Bombay Talkies.  Director: Franz Osten. Music: Saraswati Devi.  Cast: Renuka Devi, Jairaz, Maya Devi, Mira, V. H. Desai, M. Nazir, Saroj Borker, Pratima, Agha, Jani Kashmiri, P. F. Pithvala. 16mm, b&w.  Language: Hindi.

18.BHAVNI BHAVAI (A Folk Tale) 21B 1980.  Producer: Sanchar Film Co-Operative Society Ltd.  Director:Ketan Mehta.  Script: Ketan Mehta.  Photography: Krishnakant 'Pummy'. Music: Gaurang Vyas.  Cast: Naseeruddin Shah, Smitas Palil, Mohan Gokhale, Om Puri, Dina Pathak, Suhasini Mulay, Benjamin Gillani, Nimesh Desai, Gopi Desai.35mm, color, 135 min..  Language: Gujarati.

19.BHUMIKA (The Role) FCA 9388-9391 1977.  Producer: Blaze Film Enterprises.  Director: Shyam Benegal.   Story: Sangte he Aika by Hansa Wadkar.  Script: Girish Karnad, Satyadev Dubey and Shyam Benegal.   Photography: Govind Nihalini.  Music: Vanraj Bhatia.  Cast: Smita Patil, Amol Palekar, Anant Nag, Naseereddin Shah, Amrish Puri, Kulbhusan Kharbanda, Sulabha Deshpande, B. V. Karanth, Kusum

Deshpande, Baby Ruksana.  16mm, color.  Language: Hindi.

20.BHUVAN CHOME FCB 0066-0068 1969.  Producer: Chhayabani Pratisthan.  Director: Mrinal Sen. Story: Banaphul (Balaichand Mukherjee). Script: Mrinal Sen.  Photography: K. K. Majahan.  Music: Vijay Raghab Rao.  Cast: Utpal Dutta, Suhasini Mulay, Sekhar Chatterjee, Sadhu Meher, Rochak Pandit, Punyadas.  16mm, b&w. Language: Hindi. 

21.BOOT POLISH FDA 6920-6923 1954.  Producer: R. K. Studios, Raj Kapoor.  Director: Prakash  Arora. Music: Shankar-Jaikishan.  Cast: Baby Naaz, Raran Kumar, David, Chand Burque, Veera, Shailendra, Bhupendra Kapoor, Bhudo Advani, Prabhu Arora, Raj Kapoor.

22.CHAKRA (The Vicious Circle) FCA 9473-9476 1980.  Producer: National Film Development Corporation.  Director: Rabindra Dharmaraj.  Script: Rabindra Dharmaraj.  Photography: Barun Mukherjee.  Music: Hridayanath Mangeshkar.  Cast: Smita Patil, Naseeruddin Shah, Kulbhushan Kharbanda, Ranjit Choudhuri, Angali Paigankar, Uttam Sarur, Savita Bajaj, Rohini Hattangadi.  16mm, color, 140 min. Language: Hindi.

23.CHANDRALEKHA FDA 6245-6248 1948.  Producer: S. S. Vasan.  Director: S. S. Vasan. Script: P.Indra, A. Kashmiri. Photography: Kamal Ghosh.  Music: S. Rajeshvarrao, V. Shanbkar Shastry.  Cast: T. R. Rajkumari, M. K. Radha.  16mm, b&w, 208 min.  Language: Tamil.

24.CHARULATA FBA 3535-3546 1964.  Producer: R. D. Bansal.  Director: Satyajit Ray.  Story: Rabindranath Tagore.  Script: Satyajit Ray.  Music: Satyajit Ray. Photography: Subrata Mitra.  Cast: Soumitra Chatterjee, Madhabi Mukherjee, Sailen Mukherjee, Geetali Roy, Shyamal Ghosal, Subrata Sen, Bankim Ghose, Dilip Basu, Nilotpal Dey.  16mm, b&w.  Language: Bengali.

25.CHENCHUS, THE FEA 5610-5612 1971.  Director: Barin Saha. Script: Barin Saha. Photography: Barin Saha.  35mm.  Language: English.

26.DHARTE KE LAL (Children of the Earth)FBB 8220-8233 1946.  Producer: ITPA (Indian People's Theater Association). Director: K. A. Abbas.  Script: K. A. Abbas.  Music: Ravi Shankar.  Cast:Tripti Mitra, Sambhu Mitra, Balraj Shahani, Damayanti Sahani, Rashid Khan, K. N. Singh, David, Snehaprabha.  16mm, b&w. Language: Hindi.

27.DIAMOND QUEEN 21B 1940.  Producer: Wadia M. Director: Homi Wadia.  Music: Madhavial Master.  Cast: Nadia, John Cawas, Sardar Mansur, Boman Schroff, Radharani, Sayani, Nazira, Dalpat, Mithu Maya.  35mm, b&w.  Language: Hindi.

28.DO ANKHEN BARAH HAARTH (Two Eyes, Twelve Hands) FCA 4294-4298

     1957.  Producer: Rajkamal Kalamandir.  Director: V. Shantaram. 

Music: Vasant Desai.  Cast: Sandhya, V. Shantaram, Ullhas, B. M. Vyas,

Baurao Pendharkar, Paul Sharma, K. Date, S. K. Singh.  16mm, b&w. 

Language: Hindi.

29.DUNIA NA MANE (The Unexpected)FEB 8179-8193 1937.  Producer: S. Fathelal, V. Damle.  Director: V. Shantaram. Story: N. H. Apte.  Script: N. H. Apte.  Photography: V. Avadhoot. Music: K. Bhole.  Cast: Shanta Apte, Vimala Vashistha, K. Date.  35mm,b&w, 166 min.  Language: Hindi.

30.DURGA FEB 8070-8083 1939.  Producer: Bombay Talkies.  Director: Franz Osten.  Music: Saraswati Devi.  Cast: Devika Rani, Rama Shukal, Nana Palsikar, Hansa, Mumtaz Ali, V. H. Desai, P. F. Pithivala.  35mm, b&w.  Language: Hindi.

31.EK ADHURI KAHANI (An Unfinished Story) FDA 6349-6351 1971.  Producer: Arun Kaul Productions.  Director: Mrinal Sen. Story: Subodh Ghosh.  Script: Mrinal Sen.  Photography: K. K. Mahajan.Music: Vijay Raghib Rao.  Cast: Vivek Chatterjee, Aarati Bhattacharyya,

Utpal Dutta, Sekhar Chatterjee, Shyam Laha, Sobha Sen, Sadhana Roy

Chowdhury, Ajitesh Banerjee, Jnanesh Mukherjee.  16mm, b&w.  Language:

Hindi.

32.EKDIN PRATADIN (And Quiet Rolls the Day)CGA 0107-0111 FCB 0069-0072

      1979.  Producer: Mrinal Sen Productions.  Director: Mrinal Sen. 

Story: Mrinal Sen and Mohit Chatterjee.  Script: Mrinal Sen and Mohit

Chatterjee.  Photography: Ranjit Roy.  Music: B. V. Karanth.  Cast: Arun Mukherjee, Bibhas Chakrabarty, Jayanta Bhattacharyya, Nimai Ghosh, Sreela Majumdar, Salal Roy Chowdhury, Reba Roy Chowdhury.  16mm and 35mm, color.  Language: Bengali.   

33.ELIPPATHAYAM (Rat Trap)CGA 4072-4078 1981.  Producer: General Pictures.  Director: Adoor Gopalakrishnan. Story and script: Adoor Gopalakrishnan.  Photography: Ravi Verma.  Cast: Sharda, Karamana, Jahala, Rajam K. Nair, Prakash, Soman, John Samuel, B.K. Nair, Joycee, Thampi, B. Nair.  35mm, color.  Language: Malayalam. 

34.GAON SATHIS (The Friends of the Village) FDA 149 1953.  Ford Foundation.  16mm, color

35.GARM HAVA (Hot Winds)FDA 6924-6927 1975.  Producer: M. S. Sathyu, Abu Siwani and Ishan Arya.  Director:M. S. Sathyu.  Story: Kaifi Azmi, based on an unpublished story by Ismat Chugtai.  Script: Kaifi Azmi, Shama Zaidi.  Photography: Ishan Arya. Music: Ustad Bahadur Khan.  Cast: Balraj Sahni, Dinanath Zutshi, Badar Begum, Gita, Abu Siwani, Farouque Shaikh, Jamal Hashmi, Yunus Pairwaiz, Jalal Agha. 16mm, color, 136 min.  Language: Urdu.

36.GHATASHRADDHA (The Ritual)FCB 0328-0332 1977.  Producer: Suvarnagiri Films.  Director: Girash Kasaravalli. Story: Dr. U. R. Anantamurthy.  Script: Girash Kasaravalli.  Photography:S. Ramachandra.  Music: B. V. Karanth.  Cast:  Meena, Ajit Kumar,Jagannath, Ramaswamy Iyengar, Shanta, Suresh, Jagadish, Srihari, Narayana Bhatt.  16mm, 35mm, b&w.  Language: Kannada.

37.GOOPY GYNE BAGHA BYNE (The Adventures of Goopy and Bagha)FCA 9199-9200

1968.  Producer: Purnima Pictures.  Director: Satyajit Ray.  Story:

Upendra Kishore Roy Chowdhury.  Script: Satyajit Ray.  Music: Satyajit

Ray.  Photography: Soumendu Roy.  Cast:  Uttam Kumar, Sharmila Tagore,

Nirmal Ghosh, Sumita Sanyal, Subrata Sen, Kamu Mukherjee, Bharati Devi,

Jamuna Sinha, Premangshu Basu, Bireswar Sen, Satya Banerjee.  16mm, B&W. Language: Bengali.

38.HOLI (Spring Festival)CGA 3244-3249 1983.  Director: Ketan Mehta. Story: Based on a Marathi play. Script: Ketan Mehta.  35mm, color.  Language: Hindi.

39.IZZAT FEB 8094-8107 1936.  Producer: Bombay Talkies.  Director: Franz Osten.  Script: Niranjan Pal.  Music: Saraswati Devi.  Cast: Ashok Kumar, Devika Rani, Mumtaz Ali, Vimala, P. F. Pithavala, Kamta Prasad, Manohar Ghatwi. 35mm,b&w. Language: Hindi.

40.JAGTE RAHO FDA 6991-6994 1956.  Producer: R. K. Films.  Director: Sambhu Mitra and Amit Maitra.  Story and script: Sambhu Mitra and Amit Maitra.  Cast: Raj Kapoor, Pradeep Kumar, Sumitra Devi, Smitri Biswas, Pahari Sanyal,Sulochana Chatterjee, Daisy Irani.  Nana Palsikar, Iftikar,  Bikram Kapoor, Moni Chatterjee, Bhupendra Kapoorm Bhudo Acvani, Rashid Khan, Pran, Nargis.  16mm, b&w.  Language: Hindi.

41.JALSAGHAR (The Music Room)FDA 700-702 1958.  Producer: Satyajit Ray Productions.  Director: Satyajit Ray. Script: Satyajit Ray and Tarashankar Banerjee.   Photography: Subrata Mitra.  Music: Vilayet Khan.  Cast: Chhabi Biswas, Padma Devi, Gangapeda Basu, Kali Sarkar, Tulsi Lahiri, Roshan Kumari, Begum Akhtar, Ustad Wahid Khan, Pinaki Sengupta.  16mm, b&w.  Language: Bengali

42.JAWANI KI HAWA FEB 7741-7753 1935.  Producer: Bombay Talkies.  Director: Franz Osten.  Script: Niranjan Pal.  Music: Saraswati Devi.  Cast: Devika Rani, Najam, Chandra Prabha, Kamta Prasad, J. S. Kasshyap, P. F. Pithivala, Talpede, Mukherjee, Azurie.  35mm, b&w.  Language: Hindi. 

43.JEEVAN PRABHAT FEB 8275-8288 1937.  Producer: Bombay Talkies.  Director: Franz Osten.  Script: Niranjan Pal.   Music: Saraswati Devi.  Cast: Kishore Sahu, Devika Rani,Mumtaz Ali, Maya Devi, Renuka Devi, Prithviraj, Chandraprabha, Saroj Borker, P. F. Pithvala. 35mm, b&w.  Language: Hindi.

44.JHOOLA  FCA 9477-9481 1941.  Producer: Bombay Talkies.  Director: Gyan Mukerji.  Script: Gyan Mukerji.  Music: Saraswati Devi.  Cast; Leela Chitnis, Ashok Kumar, Shah Nawaz, V. H. Desai, Mumtaz Ali, Shahzadi, Nana Palsikar, Dulari. 16mm, b&w. Language: Hindi.  

45.JIS DESH ME GANGA BEHTI HAI FDA 6985-6989 1960.  Producer: R. K. Films.  Director: Radhu Karmakar. Photographer: Radhu Karmakar.  Music: Shankar-Jaikishan.  Cast: Raj Kapoor, Padmini, Pran, Tirawi, Nayampally, Chanchal, Raj Mehra, Lalita Pawar, Sulochana Chatterjee, Nana Palsikar, Vishwa Mehra, Amar.

46.JOI BABA FELUNATH (The Elephant God) 22A 1978.  Producer:  R. D. Bansal & Co.  Director: Satyajit Ray.  Story: Satyajit Ray. Script: Satyajit Ray. Music: Satyajit Ray. Photography: Soumendru Roy.  Cast:  Soumitra Chatterjee, Utpal Dutta, Siddhartha Chatterjee, Jit Bose, Santosh Dutta, Haradhan Banerjee, Satya Banerjee, Kamu Mukherjee, Bimal Chatterjee, Santosh Sinha.  35mm, color.  Language: Bengali.

47.KAADU (The Forest) 21C 1973.  Producer: L. N. Combines.  Director: Girish Karnad.  Story:  Srikrishna Alanahalli.  Script: Girish Karnad.  Photography: Govind Nihalani.  Cast: G. S. Nataraj, Amrish Puri, Nandini, Lokesh, Kalpana Sirur.  35mm, b&w.  Language: Kannada. 

48.KALYUG (The Machine Age) 17F  1981.  Producer: Film-Valas.  Director: Shyam Benegal.  Story: Girish Karnad.  Script: Girish Karnad and Shyam Benegal.  Photography: Govind Nihalani.  Music: Vanraj Bhatia.  Cast: Sashi Kapoor, Rekha, Anant Nag, Victor Banerjee, Supriya Pathak, Kulbhusan Kharbanda, Raj Babbar, Akhtar Mirza, Rima Lagu, Sunil Shanbag, Rayu Sarabhai, Vijaya Mehta, Sushma Seth, Om Puri.  16mm, Color.  Language: Hindi.

49.KANCHAN SITA (Golden Sita)CEA 0173-0182 1977.  Producer: General Pictures.  Director: G. Aravindan.  Story: Based on a play by C. N. Sreekantan Nair.  Script: G. Aravindan. Photography: Shajee N. Karun.  Music: Rajeev Taranath.  Cast: Ramdas,Venkateshwaralu, Chinna Pulliah, Kesava Panickar, Krishnan, Pottiah,Rangiah, Siva, Sobha Kiran, Annapurna.  35mm, color. Language: Malayalam.

50.KANGAN FCA 9482-9485 1939.  Producer: Bombay Talkies.  Director: Franz Osten.  Music: Saraswati Devi and Ramchandra Pal.  Cast: Leela Chitnis, Ashok Kumar, V. H. Desai, P. F. Pithavala, Muburak, Nana Palsikar, Saroj Borker, Arun Kumar, Amiya.  16mm, b&w.  Language: Hindi.

51.KAPURUSH-O-MAHAPURUSH (The Coward and the Holy Man)FCA 5669-5672

1965.  Producer:  R. D. Bansal.  Director: Satyajit Ray.  Story:

Premendra Mitra and Parasuram.  Script: Satyajit Ray.  Music: Satyajit

Ray.  Photography: Soumendu Roy.  Cast: Soumitr Chatterjee, Madhabi

Mukherjee, Haradhan Banerjee, Charuprakash Ghosh, Rabi Ghosh, Satindra

Bhattacharyya, Geetali Roy, Santosh Dutta, Satya Banerjee, Prasad

Mukherjee.  16mm, b&w.  Language: Bengali.

52.KHUD-DAAR VBC 1206-1209 1982.  Producer:  F. K. Rattonsey and Anwar Ali.  Director: Ravi Tandon.  Music: Rajesh Roshan.  Cast:  Sanjeev Kumar, Amitabh Bachchan, Vinod Mehra, Tanuja, Parveen Babi, Bindiya Goswami, Prem Chopra, Mehmood. 3/4", color.  Language: Hindi, with English credits. Received as a Copyright deposit.

53.KISMET  FCA 9461-9464 1943.  Producer: Bombay Talkie.  Director: Gyan Mukerji.  Music: Anil Biswas.  Cast: Ashok Kumar, Mumtaz Shanti, V. H. Desai, David, Shah Nawaz, Mubarak, P. F. Pithivala, Moti, handraprabha, Kanu Roy.  16mm, b&w.  Language: Hindi. 

54.KODIYETTAM (Ascent)FEB 8146-8160 1977.  Producer: Kulathoor Bhaskaran Nair.  Director: Adoor Gopalakrishnan.  Script and Story: Adoor Gopalakrishnan.  Photography: Ravi Verma.  Cast:  Gopi, Lalitha, Kaviyoor Ponamma.  35mm, b&ww, 118 min.  Language: Malayalam.

55.KOMAL GANDAR (E Flat)FEB 8236-8249 1960.  Director: Ritwak Ghatak.  Cast: Supriya Chowdhury, Avinash Bannerjee, Anil Chatterjee, Bijon Bhattacharya.  35mm, b&w, 110 min. 

Language: Bengali.

56.LUV KUSH  VAB 6689-6696 1991.  Vol. 1-8. Ramayan Uttar Kand.  Sagar Enterprises.  Producer: Ramanand Sagar.  Director: Ramanand Sagar.  8 vols. 1/2" videocassettes.  Language: Hindi

57.MAHABHARAT VAB 6725-6765 1991.  Producer: B. R. TV.  Director: B. R. Chopra and Ravi Chopra. 41 vols.  l/2" videocassettes. 

58.MAHANAGAR (The Big City)FBA 4803-4808 Producer: R. D. Bansal.  Director: Satyajit Ray.  Story: Narenda Nath Mitra.  Script: Satyajit Ray.  Music: Satyajit Ray.  Photography: Subrata Mitra.  Cast: Anil Chatterjee, Madhabi Mukherjee, Vicky Redwood,Haradhan Banerjee, Sailen Mukherjee, Jaya Badhuri, Haren Chatterjee, Subrata Sen, Samir Lahiri, Prasenjit Sarkar, Shefalika Devi, Shyamal Ghosal, Sheela Pal, Anuradha Guha, Smita Sinha.  16mm, b&w.  Language:Bengali.

59.MANTHAN (The Churning)CGA 4461-4467 1976.  Producer: Gujurat Co-Operative Milk Manufacturer's Federation.

Director: Shyam Benegal.  Story: V. Kurien and Shyam Benegal.  Script:

Vijay Tendulkar.  Photography: Govind Nihalani.  Music: Vanraj Bhatia. 

Cast: Girash Karnad, Smita Palil, Naseeruddin Shah, Amrish Puri, Mohan

Agashe, Anant Nag, Yashpal, Anjali Paigankar, Kulbhusan Kharbanda.  35mm, color, 134 min.  Language: Hindi.

60.MEGHE DHAKA TARA (Hidden Star) FEB 8207-8219 1958.  Producer: Ritwak Kumar Ghatak.  Director: Ritwak Kumar Ghatak. Story: Shaktipada Rajguru.  Script: Ritwak Kumar Ghatak.Photography: Dilip Ranjan Mukherjee.  Music: Jyotirinddra Moitra.  Cast:Supriya Choudhary, Anil Chatterjee.  35mm, b&w, 122 min.  Language: Bengali.

61.MUKHA MUKHAM CGA 4139, 4140 1984. Producer: General Pictures.  Director: Adoor Gopalakrishnan.  Script: Adoor Gopalakrishnan.  Music: M. BV. Srininvasan.  Photography: Ravi Verma.  35mm, color, 107 min.  

62.NAVJEEWAN FEB 8017-8030 1939.  Producer: Bombay Talkies.  Director: Franz Osten.  Music: Saraswati Devi.  Cast: Hansa, Rama Shukal, Mumtaz Ali, V. H. Desai, Saroj Borker, P. F. Pithivala, M. Nazir, Pratima.  35mm b&w. Language: Hindi.

63.NAYAK (The Hero)FCA 5032-5034 1966. Producer: R. D. Bansal.  Director: Satyajit Ray.  Script:Satyajit Ray.  Music: Satyajit Ray.  Cast: Uttam Kumar, Sharmila Tagore, Nirmal Ghosh, Sumita Sanyal, Subrata Sen, Kamu Mukherjee, Bharati Devi,Jamuna Sinha, Premangshu Basu, Bireswar Sen, Satya Banerjee.  16mm, b&w.  Language: Bengali.

64.NEERABA JHADA 21B Producer: Chhaya Dhwani Productions.  12r, b&w, 35mm.

65.NEWSTRACK.Monthly news video magazine covering India.  Check MUMS for complete listing.  Language: English.

66.NIRMALA FEB 8194-8206 1938.  Producer: Bombay Talkies.  Director: Franz Osten.  Music: Saraswati Devi.  Cast; Ashok Kumar, Devgika Rani, Maya Devi, Kamta Prasad, Mumtaz, Ali, P. F. Pithivala, M. Nazir, Saroj Borker, P. R. Joshi, Takle, Gulab.  35mm, b&w. Language: Hindi.

67.NIRMALAYAM (Flower Offering)FCA 9125-9128 1973.  Producer: Novel Films.  Director: M. T. Vasuderan Nair. Language: Malayalam.

68.PARASH PATHAR (The Philosopher's Stone)22A 1957.  Producer: L.B. Films International.  Director: Satyajit Ray. Story: Parasuram (Rajsekhar Basu).  Script: Satyajit Ray.  Photogrphy: Subrata Mitra.  Music: Ravi Shankar.  Cast: Tulsi Chakrabarty, Ranibala Devi, Kali Banerjee, Gangapada Basu, Mani Shrimani, Jahar Roy, Haridhan Mukherjee, Bireswar Sen, Santosh Dutta.  35mm, b&w.  Language: Bengali.

69.PARINAY  FDA 5759-5761 1974.  Producer: Samantar Chitra.  Director: Kantilal Rathod. Story: Harin Mehta.  Script: Kantilal Rathod and Vinay Shukla. Photography: K. K. Mahajan.  Music: Jaidev.  Cast: Ramesh Sharma, Shabana Azmi, Shivraj Krishnakant, Achala Sachdev, Abhijit Sen, Champshibhai Nagda.  16mm, b&w.  Language: Gujarati

70.PRAPANCHA PRASH FEB 3420-3426 

71.PRATIDWANDI (The Adversary; or Siddartha and the City)FBB 7561-7564

1970.  Producer: Priya Films.  Director: Satyajit Ray.  Script:

Satyajit Ray.  Music: Satyajit Ray.  Photography: Soumendu Roy and

Purnendu Basu.  Cast: Dhritiman Chatterjee, Debraj Roy, Kalyan

Chatterjee, Bhaskar Chowdhury, Soven Lahiri, Pisu Majumdar, Jayashree

Roy, Indira Devi, Dhara Roy, Krishna Basu, Mamata Chaterjee, Anil

Ganguly, Shefali, Biplab Chatterjee, Dibyendu Chatterjee, Arya Mukherjee, Chittaranjan Chatterjee, Mulesh Jain, Indrani Roy Chowdhury.  Language:

Bengali 

72.PREM SANYAS (Die Leuchte Asiens)FCA 6791-6793 1926.  Producer: Great Eastern Films/Emelka Films.  Director: Franz Osten, Himansu Rai.  Story: Based on Edwin Arnold's poem Light of Asia. Script: Niranjan Pal.  Photography: Josef Wirsching, Willi Kiermeier. Cast: Sita Devi, Himansu Rai.

73.RABINDRANATH FDA 0698-0699 1961.  Producer: Films Division, Gov't. of India.  Director:Satyajit Ray.  Script: Satyajit Ray.  Narration: Satyajit Ray. Photography: Soumendu Roy.  16mm, b&w.  Language: English and 14 other languages.

74.RAJNIGANDHA (Tuberoses) FCB 0106-0108 1974.  Producer: Devki Chitra.  Director: Basu Chatterjee.  Story: Mannu Bhandari.  Script: Basu Chatterjee.  Music: Salil Chowdhury.Photography: K. K. Mahajan.  Cast: Amol Palekar, Vidya Sinha, Dinesh Thakur.  16mm, color, 110 min.  Language: Hindi

75.RAM RAJYA  1-C 1943.  Producer: Prakash.  Director: Vijay Bhatt.  Music: Shanker Rao Vyas.  Cast: Shobhna Samarth, Prem Adeep, Umakant, Badriprasad,Amirbai Karnatka, Yashwant, Madhusudan, Pande, Pandit, Shanta Kumari,Athavale.  35mm, b&w.  Language: Hindi

76.RAMAYANA FBB 5943-5944 Esso World Theater.  India: Haunting Passage.

77.RAMAYANA VAB 6699-6724 Producer: Sagar Enterprises.  Director: Ramanand Sagar.  vols. 1-26, 1/2" videocassettes.

78.RAMSHASTRI 21C 1944.  Producer: Prabhat.  Director: Jagirdar.  Music: G. Damle. Cast: Jagirdar, Anant Marathe, Baby Shakuntala, Sudha Apte, Meenaxi, Hansa, Master Vithal, Lalita Pawar, Bhagwat, Manaji, Sapru, Bendra, Chhotu, Manjrekar, Ram Singh, Madhu Apte.  35mm, b&w. Language: Hindi.

79.RAVI SHANKAR PLAYS A RAGA FBB 5943-5944 Esso World Theater: India: Haunting Passage.  Director: Robin Hardy.

80.SAMSKARA (Funeral Rites)FEB 7148-7160 1970.  Producer: Pattavi Rama Reddy Productions.  Director: Pattavi Rama Reddy.  Story: U. R. Ananthamurthy.  Script: Girish Karnad. Photography: Tom Cowan.  Music. Rajeev Taranath.  Cast: Girish Karnad,Snehalata Reddy, P. Lankesh, Dasharathi Dikshit, Lakshmi Krishnamurthy. 35mm, b&w, 100 min. Language: Kannada.

81.SANKARABHARANAM VAA 3352 

82.SANT TUKARAM (Saint Tukaram) 21C 1936.  Producer: Prabhat Film Company.  Director: V. Damle, S. Fathelal.  Script: Shri Shivram Washikar.  Photography: V. Avadhoot.  Music: Keshavrao Bhole.  Cast: Vishnupant Pagnis, Miss Gouri.  35mm, b&w, 130 min.  Language: Marathi.

83.SARA AKASH (The Whole Sky)FCA 9171-9173 1969.  Director: Basu Chatterji.  Script: Basu Chatterji. Photography: K. K. Majahan.  Music: Salil Chowdhury.  Cast: Rakesh Pandey, Madhu Chanda, A. K. Hangal, Dina Pathak, Mani Kaul, Tarla Mehta,Nandita Thakur, Jalal Agha.  16mm, b&w, 100 min.  Language: Hindi.

84.SEEMABADDHA  (Company Ltd.)FCA 3471-3474 1971.  Producer: Chitranjali.  Director: Satyajit Ray.  Story: Shankar (Manisankar Mukherjee).  Script: Satyajit Ray.  Music: Satyajit Ray.  Photography: Soumendu Roy.  Cast:  Sharmila Tagore, Barun Chandra, Paramita Chowdhury, Ajay Banerjee, Prasanta Mullick, Harindranath Chatterjee, Haradhan Bannerjee, Shefali, Rita Burman, Dipankar Dey, Mani Iyer, Anita Chatterjee, Promod Ganguly, Ritun Chatterjee.  16mm, b&w. 

Language: Bengali

85.SHATRANJ KE KHILARI (The Chess Players)FCA 9287-9290 1977.  Producer: Suresh Jindal. Director: Satyajit Ray.  Story: Premchand.  Script: Satyajit Ray.  Music: Satyajit Ray.  Photography: Soumendru Roy. Cast:  Amjad Khan, Sanjeev Kumar, Saeed Jaffrey, Shabana Azmi, Richard Attenborough, Tom Altar, Victor Banerjee, Kamu Mukherjee. 16mm, color.  Language: Urdu

86.SHEHAR AUR SAPNA (The City and the Dream)FCA 4251-4254 1963.  Producer: Naya Sansar.  Director: K. A. Abbas.  Story: Inder Raj Anand.  Script: K. A. Abbas.  Music: J. P. Kaushik.  Photography:Ramachandra.  Cast: Dilip Raj, Surekha Parker, Manmohan Krishna, Anwar 

Husein, David, Nana Palsikar, Asit Sen, Jagdish Kemal, Rashid Khan,

Rakivant.  16mm, b&w. 120 min.  Language: Hindi.       

87.SHRI 420 (Mister 420)FGD 7879-7887 1955.  Producer: Raj Kapoor.  Director: Raj Kapoor. Script: K. A.Abbas, V. P. Sathe.  Photography: Radhu Karmakar.  Music: Shankar-Jaikishen.  Cast:  Raj Kapoor, Nargis, Nadira.  35mm, b&w, 169 min. Language: Hindi.

88.SHRI KRISHNA VAB 6697-6698 1991.  Producer and Director: Ramanand Sagar.  2 vols., 1/2" videocassette.  Language: Hindi

89.SUBARNAREKHA (The Golden Thread)21C 1962.  J. J. Films Corporation.  Director: Ritwak Kumar Ghatak. Story: Radheshyam Jhunjhunwala.  Script: Ritwak Jumar Ghatak. Photography: Dilip Ranjan Mukherjee.  Music: Ustad Bahadur Khan.  Cast:Madhabi Mukherjee, Abhi Bhattacharyya. Satindra Bhattacharyya, Bijan Bhattacharyya, Jahar Roy. 35mm, b&w.  Language: Bengali.

90.SUJATA FCA 9021-9024 1959.  Producer: Bimal Roy.  Director: Bimal Roy.  Script: Nabendu Ghosh.  Photography: Kamal Bose.  Music: S. D. Burman.  Cast: Nutan, Sunil Dutt. 16mm, b&w, 166 min.  Language: Hindi.

91.SWAMI (The Husband) (The Saint)FEA 9167-9170 1977.  Producer: Jaya Sarathi Combine.  Director: Basu Chatterjee. Story: Sarat Chandra Chatterjee.  Script: Basu Chatterjee. Photography:K. K. Mahajan.  Music: Rajesh Roshan.  Cast: Shabana Azmi, Girash Karnad,

Vikram, Dhiraj Kumar, Shasikala, Utpal Dutta, Preety Ganguly.  35mm,

color.  Language: Hindi.

92.SWAYAMVARAM (One's Own Choice)FEB 8031-8044 1972.  Producer: Chitralekha Film Co-operative Ltd.  Director: Adoor Gopalakrishnan.  Story and Script: Adoor Gopalakrishnan and Kumaran. Photography: Ravi Verma.  Music: M. V. Srinivasan.  Cast: Madhu, Sharada,Thikkurissi, P. K. Venukkutan Nair.  35mm, b&w.  Language: Malayalam.

93.TEEN KANYA (Three Daughters; 'Two Daughters')FCA 9392-9396

1961.  Producer: Satyajit Ray Productions.  Director: Satyajit Ray. 

Story: Rabindranath Tagore.  Script: Satyajit Ray.  Music: Satyajit Ray.Photography: Soumendu Roy.  Cast:  Anil Chatterjee, Chandana Banerjee,Soumitra Chatterjee, Aparna Dasgupta, Seeta Devi, Gita Dey, Nripati Chatterjee, Kali Banerjee, Kanika Majumdar, Kumar Roy, Santosh Dutta, Govinda Chakrabarty.  16mm, b&w.  Language: Bengali.

94.THAMPU (The Circus Tent)21C 1978.  Producer: General Pictures.  Director: G. Aravindan.  Script: G. Aravindan.  Photography: Shajee N. Karun.  Music: M. G. Ramakrishnan.  Cast: Gopi, Venu, Sreeraman, Jalaja, D. P. Nayar, K. Gopalakrishnan. Sreedharan Chembadu, Shankara Pillai, Kavitha, Rani Thankam, and artists of the Great Chitra Circus.  35mm, b&w.  Language: Malayalam.

95.TWO FBB 5943-5944 1964.  Producer: Esso.  Director: Satyajit Ray.  Script: Satyajit Ray.Music: Satyajit Ray.  Photography: Soumendu Roy.  Cast: Rabi Kiran. Television broadcast for Esso World Theater: India: Haunting Passage.16mm, b&w.  Language: English.

96.YAADEIN FCA 4255-4257 1964.  Producer: National Education and Information Films Ltd. Director: Sunil Dutt.

Source: http://www.loc.gov/rr/mopic/findaid/india.html

Songs of the Road where nature flutter its wings- Ruskin Bond and Bibhuti Bhusan Bandopadhay

Ruskin Bond in short : Ruskin Bond is a nature lover. All love Ruskin Bond because he narrates what he sees with a small tint of humour - the mountains, the nature, the people - who live their hard struggling life yet are simple and nice in their own way. Ruskin Bond despite call for a city life with dash and pomp, prefer to lead a silent writers' life at remote Landour Hills and still prefer to use the Typewriters to type his manuscripts....That's commitment to protecting nature and simple way of living a life that gets so beautifully reflected in his writings  - these are called happy books for all ages. His writing is the celebration of life with joy despite all the pains, that the author so beautifully put aside. If you read "The Room On The Roof", you definitely feel getting back something in life, that you in your city life miss.   

Ruskin Bond

Two years back I visited this site of pilgrimage with my family. But luck was not on our side and  he was not in the  home. But we spoke to one of his adopted family members and my son had posed for a photo with his adopted grand-daughter. Here is his Address for Bond lovers.

Ruskin Bond
Ivy Cottage
Landour Cantt
P.O. Mussoorie, Uttarakhand
PIN – 248179

Ruskin Bond, born 19 May 1934 in Kasauli Distt Solan, is an Indian author of British descent.

In 1992, he received the Sahitya Akademi award for his short story collection, Our Trees Still Grow in Dehra, given by the Sahitya Academy, India's National Academy of Literature. He was awarded the Padma Shri in 1999 for contributions to children's literature. He now lives with his adopted family in Landour near Mussoorie.

Bond was born in a military hospital in Kasauli, brother to Ellen and William, the children of Edith Clerke and Aubrey Bond. Ruskin’s father was with the Royal Air Force. When Bond was four years old, his mother was separated from his father and married a Punjabi-Hindu, Mr. Hari, who himself had been married once. Bond spent his early childhood in Jamnagar and Shimla. At the age of ten Ruskin went to live at his grandmother's house in Dehradun after his father's sudden death in 1944 from malaria. Ruskin was raised by his mother, who remarried an Indian businessman. He completed his schooling at Bishop Cotton School in Shimla, from where he graduated in 1952. Ruskin’s love for books and writing came early to him since his father had surrounded him with books and encouraged him to write little descriptions of nature and he took his son on hikes in the hills.

After his high school education he spent four years in England. In London he started writing his first novel, The Room on the Roof, the semi-autobiographical story of the orphaned Anglo-Indian boy Rusty. It won the 1957 John Llewellyn Rhys Prize, awarded to a British Commonwealth writer under 30. Bond used the advance money from the book to pay the sea passage to Bombay. He worked for some years as a journalist inDelhi and Dehradun. Since 1963 he has lived as a freelance writer in Mussoorie, a town in the Himalayan foothills.[1] He wrote Vagrants in the Valley, as a sequel to The Room on the Roof. These two novels were published in one volume by Penguin India in 1993. The following year a collection of his non-fiction writings, The Best Of Ruskin Bond was published by Penguin India. His interest in the paranormal led him to write popular titles such as Ghost Stories from the Raj, A Season of Ghosts, A Face in the Dark and other Hauntings.

The Indian Council for Child Education recognized his pioneering role in the growth of children's literature in India, and awarded him the Sahitya Akademi Award in 1992 for Our Trees Still Grow in Dehra. He won the Padma Shri in 1999.

Ruskin commented "The India I Love, does not make the headlines, but I find it wherever I go - in field or forest, town or village, mountain or desert - and in the hearts and minds of people who have given me love and affection for the better part of my lifetime."

Media-shy, he currently lives in Landour, Mussoorie’s Ivy Cottage, which has been his home since 1964

Most of Bond's writings show the influence from the social life in the hill stations at the foothills of the Himalayas, where he spent his childhood. His first novel, The Room On the Roof, was written when he was 17 and published when he was 21. It was partly based on his experiences at Dehra, in his small rented room on the roof, and his friends. Since then he has written over three hundred short stories, essays and novels, includingVagrants in The Valley, The Blue Umbrella, Funny Side Up, A Flight of Pigeons) and more than 30 books for children. He has also published two volumes of autobiography. Scenes from a Writer's Life describes his formative years growing up in Anglo-India; The Lamp is Lit is a collection of essays and episodes from his journal.

Bond said that while his autobiographical work, Rain in the Mountains, was about his years spent in Mussoorie, Scenes from a Writer's Lifedescribed his first 21 years. Scenes from a Writer's Life focuses on Bond's trip to England, his struggle to find a publisher for his first book The Room on the Roof and his yearning to come back to India, particularly to Doon. "It also tells a lot about my parents," said Bond. "The book ends with the publication of my first novel and my decision to make writing my livelihood," Bond said, adding, "basically it describes how I became a writer".

His novel, The Flight of Pigeons, has been adapted into the Merchant Ivory film Junoon. The Room on the Roof has been adapted in to a BBC-produced TV series. Several stories have been incorporated in the school curriculum in India, including "The Night Train at Deoli", "Time Stops at Shamli", and Our Trees Still Grow in Dehra. He received the Sahitya Akademi Award for English writing in India for Our Trees Still grows in Dehra in 1992. He has also been given the Padma Shri, one of the most prestigious civil awards in India. In 2007, the Bollywood director Vishal Bharadwajmade a film based on his popular novel for children, The Blue Umbrella. The movie won the National Award for Best Children's film.

Based on Bond's historical novella A Flight of Pigeons (about an episode during the Indian Rebellion of 1857), the Hindi film Junoon was produced in 1978 by Shashi Kapoor (directed by Shyam Benegal). Ruskin Bond made his maiden foray on the big screen with a cameo in Vishal Bhardwaj's film 7 Khoon Maaf, based on his short story Susanna's Seven Husbands. Bond appears as a Bishop in the movie with Priyanka Chopra, who kills "each of her seven husbands".[2] Bond had earlier collaborated with him in the The Blue Umbrella which was also based on his story.

Collections

Tiger in the house

Garland of Memories

The boy who broke the bank

Funny Side Up

Night Train at Deoli

Rain in the Mountains-Notes from the Himalayas

Our trees still grow in Dehra

A season of ghosts

Tigers Forever

A Town Called Dehra

The Night Train at Daoli

A Face in the Dark and Other Hauntings

Potpurri

The Adventures Of Toto

The Lost Ruby

The Death Of Trees

Novels

Room On The Roof

Scenes from a Writer's Life

Susanna's Seven Husbands

A Flight of Pigeons

Landour Days - A writers Journal

The Sensualist by Ruskin Bond

The Road To The Bazaar

The Panther's Moon

Once Upon A Monsoon Time

The India I love

The Kashmiri Storyteller

The Blue Umbrella

The Tiger In The Tunnel

Bibhutibhushan in Short : Commonality of both Bond and Bibhutibhusan begins and end at being passionate nature lover and yearning to see the old order of nature . That apart, beautiful portrayal of simple people of the roads with sympathy to their life and struggle in life of survival. But as a humanist writer, Bibhutibhushan went a few files ahead with his passion for stark portrayal of  rural lives - its struggle. And in the forests - portrayal of a few immortal characters and the life in forest.  

Bibhutibhushan would be remembered for all time for his Apu Trilogy( First Part - Pather Panchali - The song of the village road; Second Part - Aparajito - the Undefeated - the struggle of an orphaned village boy to go to city for higher study leaving aside the village odd job and a painful conflict of a lonely widowed mother's desire to have her son near her while the son's desire to study and enchanting city lifestyle; Part III- Apur Sansar - that boy lost his mother (dying alone in village without care), got settled down in an industrialised capital city of India and his relentless hunt for job, got married in a strange circumstances, lost his wife while giving birth to a boy, and Apu become vagabond while his new born child grow in his in-law's home like an orphan);

And Aranyak ( About Forest)  . A novel that would take you months to complete and for me it took ten years to complete - many times you will read some chapters and keep it aside. That because, getting into the right mental frame is a must to finish Aranyak and once you finish you know that you should have read it much earlier for the realisation of life. The novel Aranyak is a very very slow paced novel  - it is like the forest and its various characters that wave at you and say, Forest has no time, no time, no time ....it is timelessness that would engulf the readers and the journey of settlement of people near forests and spread of farmland and evolving of new village societies and its evolving culture, its struggle);   

And Chader Pahar( Set in Africa - a fiction adventure )  - in my son's list of all time best adventure stories for teenagers.

All the above were written in Bengali but later translated into many languages .

Bibhutibhushan Bandyopadhyay

 (Bengali: বিভূতিভূষণ বন্দ্যোপাধ্যায়) (listen:  Bibhutibhushon Bôndopaddhae (help·info)) (12 September 1894 - 1 November 1950) was an Indian Bengali author, and one of the leading writers of modern Bengali literature. His best known work is the autobiographical novel, Pather Panchali (The Song of the Road), adapted (along with Aparajito, the sequel) into the memorable Apu Trilogy films, directed by Satyajit Ray.



The Bandyopadhyay family originally came from Panitar village near Basirhat, North 24 Parganas district of modern-day Paschimbanga (West Bengal). Bibhutibhushan’s great-grandfather, who was a kaviraj or Ayurvedic physician, came to settle at Barakpur village near Bongaon, North 24 Parganas.

Bibhutibhushan was born at his maternal uncle’s house at Muratipur village near Kanchrapara-Halishahar, North 24 Parganas. His father Mahananda Bandyopadhyay was a Sanskrit scholar and a story-teller (Kathak) by profession. Mahananda and his wife Mrinalini had five children, of whom Bibhutibhushan was the eldest.
His home was near Gopalnagar police station in Bongaon, North Twenty Four Parganas (location 23'41+88'46). He studied at Bongaon High School, one of the oldest institutions in British India. Incidentally, he also taught at this school in the beginning of his working life. His novels Pather Panchali, Adarsha Hindu Hotel, Ichhamati, Bipiner Sansar and a few others were all set in Bongaon. Ichhamati reflects on the life of rural society on the banks of river Ichhamati in undivided southern Bengal. The story of indigo planters and plantation life, rural communities and the divers castes and their societal roles in early last century of Bengal have been captured in vivid detail. Relationships have been sensitively portrayed in their subtlest nuances. Soul-stirring descriptions of nature to the smallest details and the unselfconscious but poetic portrayal of the flora and fauna on the banks of Ichhamati are the added features of this magnificent creation. There are a lot of dialogues which bring up deep spiritual thought, advaita vedanta in particular. Peppered with a few characters who show the hypocrisy of the Brahminical order which dictated the social and religious life of rural Bengal under a deeply stratified caste system, the novel is an invaluable and otherwise inadequately documented time capsule.
Bandyopadhyay's early days were spent in abject poverty. Nevertheless, he fought his way to complete his undergraduate degree in History, at the Surendranath College, Kolkata; although he could not afford to enrol for the postgraduate course at the University of Calcutta. The economic burden of his family rested squarely on his shoulders.

He married Gouri Devi, who died during childbirth a year after their marriage. The tragic theme of her death and his loneliness is a recurrent motif in his early writings.

At 46, Bandyopadhyay married Rama Chattopadhyay. Their only son, Taradas, was born in 1947.
Bandopadhyay, before becoming a writer, took up various jobs to make ends meet. He taught at a school, became a secretary, and managed an estate. Finally, in 1921, he published his first short story, "Upekshita," in Probashi, which one of the leading literary magazines of Bengal. However, it was not until 1928, when his first novel, Pather Panchali (also known in English as Song of the Little Road), was published, that Bibhutibhushan received critical attention. With Pather Panchali, Bibhutibhushan quickly became a prominent name in Bengali literature.

Bandopadhyay had a stout constitution and walked miles in the woods every day. He usually took his notebook with him and enjoyed writing while surrounded by the wilderness.
Pather Panchali is considered to be Bibhutibhushan's masterpiece. It has been included in the CBSE syllabus for students choosing to study Bengali. He has 16 novels and over two hundred short stories to his credit.
Humayun Azad opined that the novel is superior to its cinematic rendition. This is not necessarily a commonly held view in the West, as the Apu Trilogy is considered to be among the finest films in the history of cinema, and the unavailability of a complete translation of Pather Panchali into English makes it an issue hard for the English-speaking audience to resolve: the available translation (by T. W. Clark and Tarapada Mukherji) is a truncated version of the novel. However, in the Bengali-speaking world, the stature of the novel is not seriously in doubt. Martin Seymour-Smith, in his Guide to Modern World Literature (1973), calls Bandopadhyay (he uses the form Banerji) "perhaps the best of all modern Indian novelists" and says "probably nothing in twentieth-century Indian literature, in prose or poetry, comes to the level of Pather Panchali".[2]

Apart from the translation of the truncated text by T. W. Clark and Tarapada Mukherji, Amit Chaudhuri has translated a few excerpts for inclusion in the anthologyThe Picador Book of Modern Indian Literature. In his introduction to these excerpts, Chaudhuri writes: "Unique for its tenderness and poetry ... Pather Panchalirejects both nineteenth-century realism and social realism (the social milieu described in it would have logically lent itself to the latter) for an enquiry into perception and memory." [3]

The complete text of Aparajito, the sequel to Pather Panchali, has been translated into English by Gopa Majumdar. Bibhutibhushan's works are mostly concerned with the lives of people from rural Bengal. His writings come alive with vibrant and normal characters from the countryside.

Bandopadhyay died on 1 November 1950, of a heart attack while staying at Ghatshila

Aranyak - About Forest

Complete list of novels:


Pather Panchali (Bengali: পথের পাঁচালি) (Song of the Road)
Aparajito (Bengali: অপরাজিত) (Unvanquished; sequel to Pather Panchali)
Aranyak (Bengali: আরণ্যক) (In the Forest)
Adarsha Hindu Hotel (Bengali: আদর্শ হিন্দু হোটেল)
Ichhamati(Rabindra Purashkar 1950-51) (Bengali: ইছামতি)
Dristi Pradeep (Bengali: দৃষ্টি প্রদীপ)
Chander Pahar (Bengali: চাঁদের পাহাড়)
Heera Manik Jale (Bengali: হীরা মানিক জ্বলে)
Debjan (Bengali: দেবযান)
Bipiner Sangsar
Anubartan
Ashani Sanket
Kedar Raja
Dampati
Sundarbane Sat Batsar-Not completed by him
Dui Bari
Kajol--Sequel of Aparajito -Completed By His Son Taradas
Maroner Danka Baje
Mismider Kabach
Kosi Pranganeyer Chitthi
Aam Aatir Venpu (Bengali: আম আঁটির ভেঁপু)

Partial short story collections

MeghaMallar

Mauriphool

Jatrabadol

"Jonmo o mrittu"

"Kinnardal"

"Benigir fulbari"

"Nabagata"

"Talnabami"

Films based on his works

Pather Panchali (1955)

Aparajito (1956)

Apur Sansar (1959)

Baksa Badal(1970)

Nishipadma(1970)

Amar Prem (1971) [5]

Nimantran(1971)

Ashani Sanket (1973)

Fuleswari(1974)

Alo (2003)

Source: weikipedia and my own

Charles Dickens' A Christmas Carol - that caused a silent social revolution across the western world - a remembrance on 200th birth centenary

Inspirations and earlier themes

1.    Washington Irving's essays on Christmas published in his Sketch Book (1820) The Sketch Book of Geoffrey Crayon

2.    Davies Gilbert's Some Ancient Christmas Carols (1822)

3.    William B. Sandys's Selection of Christmas Carols, Ancient and Modern (1833)

4.    Thomas K. Hervey's The Book of Christmas (1837)

Dickens' humiliating childhood experiences are indirectly responsible for the dual personality of the tale's protagonist, Ebenezer Scrooge. In 1824, Dickens' father was imprisoned in the Marshalsea and twelve-year-old Charles was forced to take lodgings nearby, pawn his collection of books, leave school, and accept employment in a blacking factory. The boy entirely uncomfortable in the presence of factory workers. He developed nervous fits. When his father was released at the end of a three-month stint, young Dickens was forced to continue working in the factory, which only grieved and humiliated him further. He despaired of ever recovering his former happy life. The devastating impact of the period wounded him psychologically, colored his work, and haunted his entire life with disturbing memories.

 Dickens both loved and demonized his father, and it was this psychological conflict that was responsible for the two radically different Scrooges in the tale – one Scrooge, a cold, stingy, and greedy semi-recluse, and the other Scrooge, a benevolent, sociable man whose generosity and goodwill toward all men earn for him a near-saintly reputation. It was during this terrible period in Dickens' childhood that he observed the lives of the men, women, and children in the most impoverished areas of London and witnessed the social injustices they suffered

How Christmas used to be

Prince Albert, Queen Victoria's German-born husband, became instrumental force to popularize the German Christmas tree in Britain after their marriage in 1841, and the first Christmas card in 1843 and a revival in carol singing in Britain.

After the book was released

Dickens' Carol was one of the greatest influences in rejuvenating the old Christmas traditions of England, but, while it brings to the reader images of light, joy, warmth and life, it also brings strong and unforgettable images of darkness, despair, coldness, sadness and death.Scrooge himself is the embodiment of winter, and, just as winter is followed by spring and the renewal of life, so too is Scrooge's cold, pinched heart restored to the innocent goodwill he had known in his childhood and youth

 

A small sample of Past Reviews

In 1843 and years and years later critics pour their heart to say

1.    A tale to make the reader laugh and cry – to open his hands, and open his heart to charity even toward the uncharitable

2.     "If Christmas, with its ancient and hospitable customs, its social and charitable observances, were ever in danger of decay, this is the book that would give them a new lease

3.     God bless him

4.     finely felt, and calculated to work much social good"

5.     The religious press generally ignored the tale but, in January 1884, Christian Remembrancer thought the tale's old and hackneyed subject was treated in an original way and praised the author's sense of humour and pathos

6.     Other critics - in the days of its first publication it was regarded as "a new gospel" and noted that the book was unique in that it actually made people behave better

7.     The New York Times published an enthusiastic review in 1863 noting that the author brought the "old Christmas … of bygone centuries and remote manor houses, into the living rooms of the poor of today"

8.    The tale has been viewed by critics as an indictment of 19th-century industrial capitalism. It has been credited with restoring the holiday to one of merriment and festivity in Britain and America after a period of sobriety and somberness. A Christmas Carol remains popular, has never been out of print, and has been adapted to film, stage, opera, and other media.

 

Carol spreads into various art forms and begin influence the society – pen becomes an instrument of  reform

^1.       By the close of February 1844, eight rival Carol theatrical productions were playing in London.

^2.       Stirling's version played New York City's Park Theatre during the Christmas season of 1844 and was revived in London the same year.

3.     Other media adaptations include film, a radio play, and a television version. In all there are at least 28 film versions of the tale. The earliest surviving one is Scrooge; or Marley's Ghost (1901)

4.     In the spring of 1844, The Gentleman's Magazine attributed a sudden burst of charitable giving in Britain to Dickens's novella;

5.    in 1874, Robert Louis Stevenson waxed enthusiastic after reading Dickens's Christmas books and vowed to give generously;

6.    Thomas Carlyle expressed a generous hospitality by staging two Christmas dinners after reading the book

7.     In America, a Mr. Fairbanks attended a reading on Christmas Eve in Boston, Massachusetts in 1867, and was so moved he closed his factory on Christmas Day and sent every employee a turkey

8.     In the early years of the 20th century, the Queen of Norway sent gifts to London's crippled children signed "With Tiny Tim's Love"

9.     According to historian Ronald Hutton, the current state of observance of Christmas is largely the result of a mid-Victorian revival of the holiday spearheaded by A Christmas Carol. Hutton argues that Dickens sought to construct Christmas as a self-centred festival of generosity, in contrast to the community-based and church-centred observations, the observance of which had dwindled during the late 18th and early 19th centuries. In superimposing his secular vision of the holiday, Dickens influenced many aspects of Christmas that are celebrated today in Western culture, such as family gatherings, seasonal food and drink, dancing, games, and a festive generosity of spirit

10.    While the 'Merry Christmas' was popularized following the appearance of the story, and the name "Scrooge" and exclamation "Bah! Humbug!" have entered the English language, Ruth Glancy argues the book's singular achievement is the powerful influence it has exerted upon its readers

11.    Crooks were not far away to profit from  its popularity. Parley's Illuminated Library pirated the tale in January 1844,and, though Dickens sued and won his case, the literary pirates simply declared bankruptcy. Dickens was left to pay £700 in costs, equal to £56,364 today

12.    Dickens later noted that he received "by every post, all manner of strangers writing all manner of letters about their homes and hearths, and how the Carol is read aloud there, and kept on a very little shelf by itself".

13.     Disney's A Christmas Carol ( 2009) – the latest release

 Dickens’s social message

Dickens asks, in effect, for people to recognise the plight of those whom the Industrial Revolution has displaced and driven into poverty, and the obligation of society to provide for them humanely. Failure to do so, the writer implies through the personification of Ignorance and Want as ghastly children, will result in an unnamed "Doom" for those who, like Scrooge, believe their wealth and status qualifies them to sit in judgement of the poor rather than to assist them