Sri Ghanashyam Mohapatra - the forgotten Odia movie maker

 We Odias are famous for being poor appreciators of those from our state who excell in the fields of art, literature, entrepreneurship and innovation. At the same time we are the champions of eulogizing Civil Servants. It is a classic trait of a feudal state and "GAAN KANIA SINGHANI NAKI" - Country girl, running nose syndrome. Making sure the message is not lost in transliteration from Odia to English, it simply means we ignore those of our own by making a pooh-pooh of their achievements.

So given an opportunity I contribute my 2 cents by highlighting those men and women from the current and previous generations from Odisha by making sure it gets to the larger audience through the social media platform of Facebook. I have already shared several blogs about such eminent personalities from my home state, from the Astronomer Pathani Samant and Utkalamani (Jewel of Odisha) Gopabandhu Das to Author Manoj Das and Filmmaker Nirad Mohapatra, and many more.

Until Chetana Samal my friend from college days and wife of Rasmi Ranjan Routray, friend from my Engineering days mentioned it to me the other day, I was barely aware of this gentleman named Ghanashyam Das from Odisha. In 2011, Odisha Society of America's Dallas Convention, she got a chance to watch the Odia movie 'Kanaklata' for the first time! She couldn't believe herself how beautifully the movie maker Sri Das had picturized the novelist Palli Kabi (Country Poet) Nanda Kishore Bal's 1925 book by the same name and that too, after 50 years.

This was one of the movies that was screened as part of inauguration of Calcutta Doordarshan. Sri Mohapatra was late in submitting this movie in 1975 for the International Film Festival as information was hard to get on time those days. Satyajit Ray immensely liked this movie made by an young man and actually Mrinal Sen had persuaded Sri Mohapatra to send the movie to the festival, like outside the competition category. This movie got rave reviews. It is the only odia movie which had a special screening for all Members of Parliament and later it was specially screened for then President of India, Nilam Sanjeev Reddy. Sri Mohapatra fondly remembers the word by word, introduction to this movie in Hindi, for the President.

Chetana and Rasmi spent a wonderful afternoon with the filmmaker and his family. He had laid out all his works showing her and talking about his career. In his twilight years too, he is full of energy and was happy to show us his works. It is very sad that such a man of talent could never be awarded even the smallest of Padma Awards. It's another matter that these Padma Awards had been so much politicized beyond redemption that there shouldn't be any remorse for not getting them.

That was the only movie Mr Das made with a loan from RBI. Later on he focused mostly on documentaries and he won a multitude of awards. He is known as Father of Documentaries in Orissa. The Old timers who are reading this posts should remember him. Thanks Chetana for giving me the opportunity to pen a few words about him. May God give him a long rewarding life.

Cornwallis and his tryst with history

 It was October 17, 1781. A bunch of so called rag tagged farmers as ridiculed by British under the leadership of George Washington forced General Cornwallis (later to become Lord Cornwallis, the Governor General of India) to surrender. America 🇺🇸 had already declared itself independent 5 years ago in 1976. The surrender of Great Britain was a matter of formality. 

In the iconic movie "The Patriot" when Cornwallis was cornered by American revolutionaries and staring at defeat, his compatriot generals were reluctant to surrender, still disillusioned with the notion of British supremacy and infallibility. But Cornwallis was prudent enough to beat the retreat rather than face any further humiliation and gotterdammerung, as he knew he was on a losing ticket.

The myth of the invincibility of English power was shattered. The Great Britain wasn't looking so great anymore. Its colony America convincingly defeated it, with quite a bit of help from the French which vindicated the adage - DUSHMAN KI DUSHMAN DOST HOTA HAI (Enemy's enemy is a friend). No doubt the French contributed its formidable military and diplomatic support to defeat the British in America and became first state to recognize the United States.

The British morale was at its lowest ebb. The future of its empire which it prided as "Sun never sets over British empire" was at stake. It's ego was tarnished and trampled in Yorktown, Virginia after its forced surrender of the English Army. But the icing of the cake, its new colony of India 🇮🇳 inside where it was on an expansion spree wasn't looking so good as Tipu Sultan, the King of Mysore was giving it a run for money. 

A dejected Cornwallis returned back to England and five years later he had to go on a voyage to India as the Commander-in-Chief of the British India Army to secure its empire there. The iron was hot. The English were most vulnerable at the time. It was the time for India to deal the final blow to the British occupation. Tipu Sultan had already defeated the British in the second Anglo-Mysore and forced them to a sign a treaty in Mangalore.

The French sensed an opportunity and tried to teach the English a lesson in India. They had to relinquish India not so long ago which the French General Joseph Dupleix almost managed to drive away the British. Now after successfully helping the Americans to defeat British they were anxious to replicate the same in India by extending their help to Tipu Sultan.

But unfortunately for India, history had something else written in its fate. The French connection wasn't much fruitful due the inopportune time of internal turmoil in France with the advent of the French revolution. But still Tipu could have put the final nail in the British coffin if the Marathas and Nizam of Hyderabad supported him (the other powers of the yesteryear, the Mughals and Rajputs were already a spent force).

It didn't happen. British, the master of divide and conquer policy managed to keep the Nizam and Marathas away from Tipu and finally defeated him. It was the last, real opportunity for us to force a Brexit ahead of time, but we missed the boat.

The British tried its classic divide and rule policy in America too, but spectacularly failed as its founding fathers, especially Benjamin Franklin could foresee it and spread the message to the Americans to stay united in his journal "Philadelphia Gazette". But divided along the lines of caste, creed, religion, ethnicity and plagued by serious regionalism and factionalism blended with parochial outlook we provided the British the perfect recipe to divide and rule. Cornwallis succeeded in India when he failed in America. History has taught us so many lessons. One among them -United we win,  divided we fall.

Rihanna and the aftermath of her tweet

 I just heard her name. Never have listened to a single song of her. Now Rihanna is a house holder name in India by virtue of her Twit sympathizing with the ungoing farmer's agitations in and around Delhi.

The singer wanted to get some free publicity. She got it and we did a fabulous job at fulfilling her desire by straight walking into her trap. Forget Rihanna, many back home who themselves and non in their 14 previous generations from both sides of parents knew about pop music have suddenly become her critics. Not to be left behind our External Affairs Ministry has jumped too fast, too soon protesting her tweets, double dipping the attention she is got. We drool over any attention we can get from Westerners.

If an Akshay Kumar or Kangana tweets about some demonstration in US, will the President of US, the Democrats or the Secretary of State will give a damn ? I don't think so. Rihanna is accused of being a foreigner interfering in India's internal matter. Akhshay Kumar, the actor who is incidentally a citizen of Canada is considered as a hero for supporting the BJP led government. The diehard Bhakts sing eulogies of Akshay Kumar - no matter he being a Canadian citizen, at the same time accusing Rhianna as a foreigner. Double standards is our forte and no wonder we are World's Champion hypocrites.

Didn't a good section of folks in India whole heartedly supported Trump during the last US Elections, a clear case of interference in the internal affairs of a country ? What you call them ? Did we

forget that a certain immature Prime Minister was dancing in a stadium in Texas proclaiming - AB KI BAAR, TRUMP SARKAR (Next time it will be Trump's government) in a different country ? Can't it be construed as interference in the internal matter of another nation ? 

In the quest of getting publicity the girl and this man aren't a whole lot different. What a stupid thing to do by the leader of billion plus people when Netanyahu, his Israeli counterpart and a close associate of Trump didn't publicly endorse the later. Both are Prime Ministers, but similarities end there. One is a seasoned, mature leader, one is a myopic person prone to preposterous histrionics.

In meantime some Right wingers are branding the Sikh protestors as secessionist Khalistanis. The Bhakt brigade and RSS folks who rarely serve in military are questioning the patriotism of Punjabis who form the backbone of our defense forces. 

They should not forget that during partition riots in 1947 when Hindus were killed and their women raped in today's Pakistan, the RSS leaders ran away with their tails well tucked between their hind legs. At that time Sikhs provided a formidable resistance and came to the rescue of the Hindus. Now from their armchairs the Bhakts are accusing Sikhs of being unpatriotic.

Finally the BJP led government has procrastinated the law for one and half years as it chickened out. Why ? The UP Election is just one year from now and further fiasco can cost BJP the state of UP. And losing UP couple of years before the 2024 General Elections doesn't augur well for BJP. 

A party which prides itself as - JO KAHTA HAI SO KARTA HAI (What it says is what it does) has spectacularly failed to deliver yet again. After coming to power in 2014, sans scrapping the controversial Article 370 in Kashmir, BJP has failed to implement its agenda - from Demonetiziton, GST to the latest Farm Bill. So much for the party with a difference !!!