Today March 23 is Bhagat Singh Martyrdom DayWatch ‘INQUILAB’, a documentary film. Scripted and directed by noted filmmaker Gauhar Raza, this documentary traces the evolution of the revolutionary icon as a political thinker and a visionary. Well known historian Irfan Habib is the subject expert. It is produced by Nehru Memorial Museum and Library in collaboration with the Act Now for Harmony and Democracy.
This documentary traces the evolution of this revolutionary icon as a political thinker and a visionary. It begins by tracking the early influences, his revolutionary family, locating him in the national and international political context and finally tracing the roots of his future ideological formations. Bhagat Singh was an Anarchist, a Marxist and an Atheist.
The film spends little time in glorifying Bhagat Singh and his comrade’s revolutionary actions. Scripted and directed by noted filmmaker Gauhar Raza, the film contains archival footage and original visuals of locations, rather than a dramatic re-picturisation, which gives the film an authentic look. Textual materials have been effectively used to illustrate his political persona and it delineates the dreams of the revolutionaries to create an independent, socialist and multi-cultural India. This film attempts to craft an intellectual biography of Bhagat Singh in an audio-visual format.
The documentary will be followed by a discussion.
Gauhar Raza established the Jahagirabad Media Institute. An electrical engineer by qualification, a social scientist, a communicator working in the area of Public Understanding of Science, Cultural Studies and with more than 20 years of experience in conceiving and formulating national and cross-country research projects.
He has published seven books and more than 25 research papers, articles and reports and lectured on Public Understanding of Science. He has also produced 11 video documentary films on socially relevant subjects as well as TV serials for children.
He was awarded the best subject expert for educational film in 1999, and the Creative Literature Award, Hindi Academy, 2001, for his collection of poems 'Jazbon Ki Lau Tez Karo'.
S Irfan Habib is Consultant and subject expert in the film. This documentary emerged out of his book project To Make the Deaf Hear: Ideology and Programme of Bhagat Singh and his Comrades. He works with the National Institute of Science, Technology and Development Studies (NISTADS). He has been working in the area of modern Indian history as well as history of science and scientific ideas during colonial India. His other books co-authored or co-edited with Dhruv Raina are Domesticating Modern Science, Situating the History of Science: Dialogues with Joseph Needham and A Social History of Science in Colonial India.
Produced by Nehru Memorial Museum and library in collaboration with ANHAD (Act Now for Harmony and Democracy)
-------Fredy K Thazhath