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Today’s song is from film Manthan-76. This was one of the films, which was very close to my heart. I must have seen it at least 3 times-an honour which I bestowed on only few films. Everything about this film was good-Story, Director, Actors and above all the only song in the film, sung so beautifully by Preeti Sagar.

This film was based on the work of Dr. Verghese Kurien, the person who helped the White Revolution to bloom in India. This film is close to my heart, because I have met Dr Kurien twice in my professional career. While working as the Head of the Veterinary Division of Glaxo, for the Western India, I had two occasions when I personally met Dr. Kurien in his office at Anand. That was somewhere in 1981.

I reduced seeing films in the 70’s beginning, for two reasons. One I was busy in Career building and family raising. The second reason was, the complexion of the films made from the 70s onwards were mostly ‘ Boy Meets Girl ‘ type escapist films.The films had sweet looking Heroines and Chocolate Heroes. There was no difference in film stories- only change of names and locations. Directors like Nasir Hussain publically admitted to having made films on same stories with minor changes. Such escapist films ended my interest in them In addition, the type of music in films was not of my choice or liking.

just imagine. a Chocolate Hero- Rajesh Khanna-emerged on the success horizon with film Aaradhana-69 and created an all time record( still unbroken) of 15 consecutive solo Hit films from just 1969 to 1971 ! The public too wanted to only the goody-goody films. Of course, there were exceptions but only exceptions, mind you, in Hindi films.
During this period, films called ” Parallel Cinema” or ” New Wave Cinema” or just the ” Art Films” flourished and provided relief to people like me. Some of these were blatant Art films, but most were entertaining and tackled day to day issues of the common people.

Parallel cinema was a film movement in Indian cinema that originated in the state of West Bengal in the 1950s as an alternative to the mainstream commercial Indian cinema, represented especially by popular Hindi cinema, known today as Bollywood.

Inspired by Italian Neo realism, Parallel Cinema began just before the French New Wave and Japanese New Wave, and was a precursor to the Indian New Wave of the 1960s. The movement was initially led by Bengali cinema and produced internationally acclaimed filmmakers such as Satyajit Ray, Mrinal Sen, Ritwik Ghatak, Tapan Sinha and others. It later gained prominence in other film industries of India and Bangladesh.

It is known for its serious content, realism and naturalism, symbolic elements with a keen eye on the sociopolitical climate of the times, and for the rejection of inserted dance-and-song routines that are typical of mainstream Indian films.

Realism in Indian cinema dates back to the 1920s and 1930s. One of the earliest examples was Baburao Painter’s 1925 silent film classic Savkari Pash (Indian Shylock), about a poor peasant (portrayed by V. Shantaram) who “loses his land to a greedy moneylender and is forced to migrate to the city to become a mill worker. Acclaimed as a realistic breakthrough, its shot of a howling dog near a hut, has become a milestone in the march of Indian cinema.” The 1937 Shantaram film Duniya Na Mane (The Unaccepted) also critiqued the treatment of women in Indian society.

The Parallel Cinema movement began to take shape from the late 1940s to the 1965, by pioneers. This period is considered part of the ‘Golden Age’ of Indian cinema. This cinema borrowed heavily from the Indian literature of the times.

Early examples of Indian cinema’s social realist movement include Dharti Ke Lal (1946), a film about the Bengal famine of 1943 directed and written by Khwaja Ahmad Abbas, and Neecha Nagar (1946), a film directed by Chetan Anand and written by Khwaja Ahmad Abbas that won the Grand Prize at the first Cannes Film Festival. Since then, Indian independent films were frequently in competition for the Palme d’Or at the Cannes Film Festival throughout the 1950s and early 1960s, with some of them winning major prizes at the festival.

During the 1950s and the 1960s, intellectual filmmakers and story writers became frustrated with musical films. To counter this, they created a genre of films which depicted reality from an artful perspective. Most films made during this period were funded by state governments to promote an authentic art genre from the Indian film fraternity. The most famous Indian “neo-realist” was the Bengali film director Satyajit Ray. Ray’s most famous films were Pather Panchali (1955), Aparajito (1956) and The World of Apu (1959), which formed The Apu Trilogy. Produced on a shoestring budget of Rs. 150,000 , the three films won major prizes at the Cannes, Berlin and Venice Film Festivals, and are today frequently listed among the greatest films of all time.

Certain art films have also garnered commercial success, in an industry known for its surrealism or ‘fantastical’ movies, and successfully combined features of both art and commercial cinema. An early example of this was Bimal Roy’s Do Bigha Zamin (1953), which was both a commercial and critical success. The film won the International Prize at the 1954 Cannes Film Festival and paved the way for the Indian New Wave. Hrishikesh Mukherjee, one of Hindi cinema’s most successful filmmakers, was named the pioneer of ‘middle cinema’, and was renowned for making films that reflected the changing middle-class ethos. Renowned Filmmaker Basu Chatterjee also built his plots on middle-class lives and directed films like Piya Ka Ghar, Rajnigandha and Ek Ruka Hua Faisla. Another filmmaker to integrate art and commercial cinema was Guru Dutt, whose film Pyaasa (1957) featured in Time magazine’s “All-TIME” 100 best movies list.

In the 1960s, the Indian government began financing independent art films based on Indian themes. Many of the directors were graduates of the Film and Television Institute of India(FTII), in Pune. The Bengali film director Ritwik Ghatak was a professor at the institute and a well-known director. Unlike Ray, however, Ghatak did not gain international fame during his lifetime. For example, Ghatak’s Nagarik (1952) was perhaps the earliest example of a Bengali art film, preceding Ray’s Pather Panchali by three years, but was not released until after his death in 1977. His first commercial release Ajantrik (1958) was also one of the earliest films to portray an inanimate object, in this case an automobile, as a character in the story, many years before the Herbie films.

During the 1970s and the 1980s, parallel cinema entered into the limelight of Hindi cinema to a much wider extent. This was led by such directors as Gulzar, Shyam Benegal, Mani Kaul, Rajinder Singh Bedi, Kantilal Rathod and Saeed Akhtar Mirza, and later on directors like Govind Nihalani, becoming the main directors of this period’s Indian art cinema. Mani Kaul’s first several films Uski Roti (1971), Ashadh Ka Ek Din (1972), Duvidha (1974), were critically appreciated. Parallel cinema of this time gave careers to a whole new breed of young actors, including Shabana Azmi, Smita Patil, Amol Palekar, Om Puri, Naseeruddin Shah, Kulbhushan Kharbanda, Pankaj Kapoor, Deepti Naval, Farooq Shaikh, and even actors from commercial cinema like Hema Malini, Raakhee, Rekha ventured into art cinema.

These actors did not have an easy entry even in Parallel cinema. Basu Chatterji once narrated how Amol palekar’s entry met with opposition.” I was to make ” Piya ka ghar”-72 for Rajeshree prodn. I took Rajkumar Barjatya to watch Amol in drama ” Aadhey Adhurey”, but Raj was not willing to gamble with an actor, who was the very antithesis of a ‘ Star ‘. He took Anil Dhavan for that film. After ‘ Rajnigandha ‘ became a hit, the same Rajkumar Barjatya wanted only Amol for his next film ” Chitchor”-76. ”

By the early 1990s, the rising costs involved in film production and the commercialisation of the films had a negative impact on the art films. The fact that investment returns cannot be guaranteed made art films less popular amongst filmmakers. Underworld financing, political and economic turmoil, television, and piracy proved to be fatal threat to parallel cinema, as it declined.

One of the major reasons for the decline of the parallel cinema in India is that the F.F.C. or the National Film Development Corporation of India did not seriously look into the distribution or exhibition of these films. The mainstream exhibition system did not pick up these films because these films did not have the so-called ‘entertainment value’ that they were looking for. Thus, it left to a few Film Societies to screen these film; that too on a single screening basis. The advent of television and its popularity saw the film society movement decline. Gradually, the government reduced the patronage of such films, for they had only unseen films to be shown on their balance sheets.
Manthan ( Churning) is a 1976 Hindi film directed by Shyam Benegal, inspired by the pioneering milk cooperative movement of Verghese Kurien, and was written jointly by him and Vijay Tendulkar. It is set amidst the backdrop of the White Revolution of India. Aside from the great measurable success that this project was, it also demonstrated the power of “collective might” as it was jointly crowd funded by 500,000 farmers who donated Rs. 2 each, when it was found that the budget provided by NFDC for it, was insufficient.
The film won the 1977 National Film Award for Best Feature Film in Hindi and National Film Award for Best Screenplay for Vijay Tendulkar, and was also India’s submission for the Academy Award for Best Foreign Language Film for 1976.

The title song (“Mero Gaam Katha parey”) was sung by Preeti Sagar. She won the Filmfare Award for Best Female Playback Singer for that year. The song was later used as the soundtrack for the television commercial for Amul.

The word Manthan literally means “churning”, and other meanings may be deep contemplation, churning of facts, analysis aimed at a solution or conclusion. The film traces a small set of poor farmers of Kheda district in Gujarat who had the vision and foresight to act in a way that was good for the society and not for the self alone. Under leaders like local social worker Tribhovandas Patel, who took up the cause of the farmers, lead to the formation of Kaira District Co-operative Milk Producers’ Union. Soon the pattern was repeated in each district of Gujarat, which in turn led to the formation of Amul, a dairy cooperative in Anand, Gujarat in 1946, which is today, jointly owned by some 2.6 million milk producers in Gujarat, India.

Eventually, this led to the initiation of White Revolution of India in 1970, by creating a “Nationwide Milk Grid”, and the setting up of Gujarat Co-operative Milk Marketing Federation Ltd. (GCMMF) in 1973, whose 500,000 members jointly financed the film, by donating Rs. 2 each, when NFDC budget for this film as sanctioned was found to be insufficient. Upon its release, truckloads of farmers came to see “their” film, thus making it a box office success.

Trivia- From 1946 to 2012, till his death, Kurien was in Gujarat, but he could never speak Gujarati. Though a Christian, he was cremated in Nadiad, where he breathed his last, as per his last wish.

The Music Director for this film was Vanraj Bhatia, a very highly educated Music expert. Born in 1927 in Bombay, Vanraj Bhatia trained in Western classical music while studying at the Elphinstone College in Mumbai for M.A. (English Honours); after graduating in 1949 he left for the Royal Academy of Music, London, to study music composition, which he passed with a Royal Academy Gold Medal in 1954.

Thereafter he entered the Paris Conservatory between 1954 and 1959. During his studies abroad he received various scholarships.

In 1960, he started his career as Reader in Musicology in charge of Western Music, at the Faculty of Music Delhi University, where he stayed until 1965.

Meanwhile, in 1959, he created his first advertising jingle for Shakti Silk Sarees. From that point on he became one of the pioneering ad jingle makers in India, and also one of the most successful, later moving to Mumbai and working for the advertising industry. In all he has created over 7000 scores for advertising jingles, corporate and business films.

His first film as a music composer was Ankur (1974), and he soon became a regular composer for Shyam Benegal and other art film makers of the time. He gave music to 23 films,composing 78 songs. His most noted works in this period are Manthan (1976), Bhumika (1977), Junoon (1978), 36 Chowringhee Lane (1981), Trikal (1985) and Mandi (1983) and Jaane Bhi Do Yaaro (1983).

He has also created music for Indian theatre productions such as “Tughlak” and “Andha Yug”.

In the following decade, his work was heard constantly on Indian television with the title scores for TV series like Khandaan, Yatra, Lifeline, Discovery of India, Wagle Ki Duniya, and the made-for-TV film Tamas (1987), for which he received the National Film Award for Best Music Direction in 1988.

In the 1990s, he worked in many commercial Hindi films as well as providing background scores for many other films, working on over 40 films during his career. His most noted works were for Shyam Benegal’s film Sardari Begum in 1996 and for Vijay Singh’s international film Jaya Ganga.

He is the composer of the famous Liril soap jingle “La… Lalala.la..”

The story of film Manthan-76, adapted from Wikipedia is …

The film traces the origins of the movement through its fictionalised narrative, based around rural empowerment, when a young veterinary surgeon, played by Girish Karnad, a character based on the then National Dairy Development Board (NDDB) chief, the 33-year-old Verghese Kurien, who joined hands with local social worker, Tribhovandas Patel, which led to the setting up of a local milk cooperative, in Anand, Gujarat.

Dr. Rao (Girish Karnad), a young veterinary doctor with his team of Deshmukh (Mohan Agashe), Chandravarkar (Anant Nag) and others comes to a village in Kheda district, Gujarat. The village is inhabited by poor people whose chief occupation seems to be cattle-rearing and producing milk, which they sell to a local dairy owner Mishra Ji (Amrish Puri). Mishra Ji pays them ridiculously low amounts for their milk. Dr. Rao and his team have arrived with the purpose of setting up a co-operative society dairy which will be owned collectively and managed by the villagers themselves. As Dr. Rao and his team grapple with village politics, rigid casteism and general distrust of the village folk, they face planned hostility from the local Harijan community’s leader Bhola (Naseeruddin Shah) who harbours deep anger and resentment against the higher caste Panchayat Head (Kulbhushan Kharbanda). Local village women are led by a feisty young woman Bindu (Smita Patil), mother of a young child whose husband has supposedly left her.

Dr. Rao wins the trust of Bindu and other villagers by testing their milk and paying them fair amounts for their high fat-content milk and this irks Mishra Ji. Deshmukh is worried by the caste politics and divide between the higher castes and Harijans in the village and repeatedly warns Rao against getting involved in it. Chandravarkar gets attracted to a local Harijan girl and has a few rendezvous with her in secret. The Harijans don’t want to join the co-operative as they feel that the higher caste Panch and his cronies will usurp the society as well. Rao and his associates talk sense into them and organise for an election for the post of the head of the co-operative. Bhola begins to trust and believe in Rao’s ideals when Rao fires Chandravarkar for having fun with the Harijan girl on pretext of marrying her and bails Bhola out of jail when Panch gets him arrested for rowdy behaviour.

Meanwhile, a mutual admiration and liking develops between Rao and Bindu, which is cut short when Bindu’s husband returns home suddenly and Rao’s wife comes to visit him in the village. In the election, the Harijan representative Moti defeats the Panch in a tiebreaker and the Harijans erupt in joy. The Panch takes the loss terribly on his ego and joins Mishra Ji, also aided by Bindu’s husband. Together, they force Bindu to put her thumb impression on legal papers that claim Dr. Rao has raped her. Dr. Rao is extremely agitated when the allegations are brought against him and starts to wonder whether or not he has bitten off more than he can chew. His wife also falls sick with Typhoid. Dr. Rao finishes the setting up of the board and leaves with his wife. This greatly troubles Bhola as he considers this cowardice on Dr. Rao’s part. Bhola, however, continues to carry on the work of the co-operative with support from a few villagers and notably, Bindu. Both of them have been inspired and churned as new, brave individuals by the work of Dr. Rao.

With this song, the film makes a Debut on the Blog and since there was only one song in the film, all songs in the film also completed.The song is the Title song of the film, used many times in the film as background song. It is based on a Folk song of Gujarat. The song is enchanting and once heard it keeps on coming back again and again. See for yourself…..

(Ack- information from Gaata rahe mera dil by Aniruddha and Balaji, wiki and The Hindu is used in adapted form here.)

Audio (Full)

Video (All parts)

Song- Mero gaam kaatha paarey (Manthan)(1976) Singer- Preeti Saagar, Lyricist- Neeti Saagar, MD- Vanraj Bhatia

Lyrics

mero gaam kaatha paare
jyaan doodh ki nadiya waahe
jyaan koyal tahuko gaaye
mhaare ghar aangna na bhoolo na
hey mhaare ghar aangna na bhoolo na
mero gaam kaatha paare
jyaan doodh ki nadiya waahe
jyaan koyal tahuko gaaye
mhaare ghar aangna na bhoolo na
hey mhaare ghar aangna na bhoolo na

mhaare gaamde leelalaher
jyaan naache mor ne dhel
jyaan doodh ki relamchhel
jyaan vad pipal ni chhainyaa
suh ti charti gaiya
aao aao re ae ae
aao aao re mhaare gaam
sabko pyaaro mhaaro dhaam
yaad rakhiyo mero shyaam
mare ghar aangna na bhulo na
hey mhaare ghar angana na bhoolo na
kabhi rukna mhaare gaam
o pardesiya
o pardesiya
o pardesiya
o pardesiya