[Reader-list] Aurora

[sougata bhattacharya]

To the reader list : This is the third episode of my research work that
I'm working under the Sarai independent Research Grant.  
Comments and suggestions are cordially welcome ....Sougata.

This is an interview with Mr. Biswanath Mitra (Editor), working at 'Aurora Film Corporation' for last 64 years.

Q. How long you are working for Aurora?
A. Since 1939. When I joined Aurora Film Corporation, I was 17 years old. Though I knew Aurora earlier.
Q. How? 
A. I was a resident of 41, Kashi Mitra Ghat Road from my childhood. Anadi babu was the maternal uncle of my mother. On the other hand, my maternal uncle was the nephew of Anadi Nath Bose. I lost my parents in my childhood and came to Anadi babu's residence.
Q. You have seen Early Aurora

A. Yes. But I did not take part in any of its activities.
Q. How was Aurora then?
A. Aurora's office was at 41, Kashi Mitra Ghat Road. Debi Ghosh and Charu Ghosh used to come here regularly. Two or three rooms at the ground floor were always occupied for projection machines, film rolls, cameras etc. I heard that Aurora's film processing laboratory was also at the same house earlier. Though I did not see it. By that time it was shifted to Rajballavpara (Kolkata). Once Anadi Nath Bose took the charge of 'Monmohan Theatre'. At that time several eminent personalities like Kazi Nazrul Islam, Dani babu, Nirmalendu Lahiri and others used to come Aurora's office.
Q. Did Anadi Nath Bose associated with Theatre business also?
A. Not exactly. More than a business, it was his amateur. I think it was due to the closeness of these two form of narrative entertainment. In Bengal, during those days, theatre was more popular than cinema. Moreover, 'Aurora Touring Party' had its own theatre team for itinerant shows. Itinerant shows means a combination of film shows, magic shows and theatre shows. 
Q. Did you see Aurora's itinerant exhibition?
A. Not those film shows. But I saw the activities of touring party at our house. Just after the Durgapuja festival, Those teams used to get out and traveled throughout the Bengal, Bihar, Assam for entire winter season. I saw three similar teams. Among the three managers, one was my maternal uncle, Sati Bhusan Ghosh. The other two was Ashu Gupta and 
..(sorry! I can't recall it).
Q. How long this business run?
A. Up to the mid 1930s until Aurora had its own studio and fully shifted in distribution and production business.
Q. But as far I read, tent shows lost its popularity from early 1920s

A. That was happened in cities and developing villages, not in the entire Bengal. Moreover we had some invitations from different landlords at their palaces.
Q. Did Aurora has any permanent cinema hall?
A. Yes. Till 1947, in undivided Bengal, Aurora had several cinema halls. I saw one hall at 'Pabna' and one at 'Faridpur' which we had to leave after independence. At that time we also had to leave few other halls as those were remained under the territory of East Pakisthan. In West Bengal, we had two cinema halls, one at Kharagpur and one at Midnapur. Both were named 'Aurora Talkies' and still exist. Once Aurora took lease one cinema hall at Howrah for few days.
Q. What type of films Aurora used to show in silent era?
A. Foreign short-films, mainly comedy gags were exhibited for tent shows. In the city, there were Madan's films and moreover, Aurora had its own Bengali films.
Q. Did you see any silent film of Aurora?
A. Yes, I did. 
Q. Was there any specialty in Aurora's films?
A. It's very difficult to say. It was my boyhood, you know, I hardly can remember those things.
Q. Did you participate in any of those productions?
A. No, I did not. Before to join here, I was not interested in films except viewing.
Q. Then why did you join here?
A. After matriculation, I was moving as a vagabond. I started a business at Ranchi but it failed. Then Anadi Nath Bose told me to work here.
Q. You joined as a 

A. As a laboratory assistant.
Q. How much was your salary then?
A. First six months I got nothing. Then my monthly salary was fixed at Rs.10/-.
Q. How longs you worked for Rs.10/-?
A.There is a story behind it. I found interest in editing. At that time, Biren Guha was the editor of Aurora. Though I learned nothing from him. Very soon he resigned and Santosh Gangooly took the charge. He taught me editing, aesthetically, practically. In 1942 Aurora was producing a film 'Patibrata'. During its post production, suddenly the editor left the job and the studio manager could not find out any other editor to complete the film. Some of my colleagues proposed my name to Anadi babu. Though the manager did not want to give me the chance, but anyway, I got the opportunity to edit the film. I did it well. Several people praised my edit-work and I became the permanent editor of Aurora. My salary jumped into Rs.150/- per month.
Q. Wow! It was a great jump!
A. Yah! After 'Patibrata', I edited all films, produced by Aurora.
Q. But in the whole decade of 1940s Aurora produced only four films

A. That decade was disturbed for second world war. Surrounding our studio, there was a slum area of Muslim inhabitants. During that time, studio was closed for a long time due to Hindu-Muslim riot. 
Q. Then most of the time you had to remain idle?
A. No-no. Aurora produced lots of documentary. We were always busy in it.
Q. It's interesting. When feature film had a huge market, apart from mainstream business, Aurora constantly produced nonfictions
.
A. From 1938 Aurora started production of 'Aurora Screen News'. In fact, the touring party never stopped. Only shifted from the exhibition of films to the production of documentaries. The team moved entire Bengal, Bihar, Orissa, Asam or United provinces and captured almost every item they found interesting like from rituals to festivals or from lifestyles to memorable events.  Indeed, we produced a lot. Aurora recorded speeches of several eminent personalities like, Subhash Chandra Bose, Jwaharlal Nehru, Shyamaprasad Mukhopadhyay, Rabindranath Tagore and so on. To capture a news regarding earthquake at Muzaffarpur, Aurora hired an aeroplane to reach there. 
Q. Was there a very good market of those documentaries?
A. Not at all. Those were for free screening purposes only. It was a passion of Anadibabu. Or perhaps, he could understand the potentiality of Documentaries. But unfortunately, In 1946, all those were damaged by fire.
Q. But why Aurora did not produce feature films in large scale?
A. Aurora was the sole distributor of New Theatres' Bengali films. Here distributor means financier. Actually, Aurora was the financier of most of the Bengali films produced by New Theatres Ltd.
Q. But after all those films are labeled as New Theatres' films

A. It does not matter. In fact, at that time, Aurora had no modern equipment. Anadibabu purchased all second hand equipment. Those cameras, talkie sets or others were not sufficient for talkie film production. On the other hand New Theatres appeared with advanced equipment support. B.N.Sirkar himself was an educated, intellectual and technologically sound person with lot of enthusiasm. Anadibabu was a vastly experienced person who immediately tied up with New Theatres. Moreover, Anadibabu was quite old to take the hazards of feature film production. I think, he preferred to concentrate in a particular segment of business that is distribution.
Q. Do you think distribution was the main business of Aurora that helped it to survive so many years?
A. Yes, I think distribution business was the key source of finance because it was not only restricted in Bengal, but also spread South India, Cylone and Far-East countries.
Q. How many people worked in Aurora at that time?
A. When I joined, in studio, there were around 30 employees and around 20 staff at our office. There was a branch office at Madras and also one in Rengoon. But I think those were small and just for distribution purpose. Maximum two or three people worked there.
Q. Were all of you paid staff?
A.Yes.All of us.
Q. Was there any scope to interfere in other's work? Like, did you work anything else apart from editing?
A. All of us had to do several other works beside our own. It was mandatory for me to be present at the floor or location during shooting. I used to do different production work like, artists' contract, location hunting and so on. Sometimes, carrying those film cans, I used to go to different cinema halls in districts or outside Bengal. When Aurora produced colour films for different commission projects, I had to go Mumbai for developing and printing of those films. I also shot several newsreels for Aurora.
Q. Did you work as a cameraman too?
A. No-no. There were cameramen for feature films and documentaries. For news coverage we used some old cameras, which were very easy to operate. I only shot some of those news items. 
Q. Did you ever direct any film?
A. Few documentaries like, ' Bigata Diner Smriti', 'Deep Sea Hunting' and so on.
Q. Would you like to share those experiences?
A. 'Bigata Diner Smriti' was a project of Govt. of West Bengal, mainly a travelogue on Gour, Malda. Rather, 'Deep Sea Hunting' was interesting. This film was based on fisherman's lifestyle and their socio-economic problems. There was a director for this film. But after the first phase of shooting in the land area, he denied to go into the deep sea with those fishermen. Having no other alternative, I went on board a trawler with one of my camera operator. It was 10 days' experience.
Q. Had you ever directed any feature film?
 A. No, I did not.
Q. Did you edit any other film outside Aurora?
A. No, I did not.
Q. Why did not you think for freelance work as an editor?
A. Film industry is an unorganized sector, you know. There are lots of uncertainties in this profession. Here, in Bengal, technicians are never being paid well.
Q. Do you have the same grievance to Aurora?
A. No. At least I had a security here. 
Q. What was an average cost for feature film at that time?
A. As far I know, it needed Rs.30000/- to produce Aurora's first full length talkie film, 'Patibrata'. It was in 1942. In the 1950s, the average cost was around Rs.50000/-. Though our biographical films like, 'Raja Rammohan' and 'Bhagini Nibedita' were more expensive due to the sets, props and costumes. Moreover, few locations of 'Bhagini Nibedita' were shot in London.
Q. How did you enjoy the England tour?
A. Only the director and the cameraman went there. Camera and other equipment were hired from London. They shot different locations from London. Finally, here in the post production, characters were superimposed on those locations.
Q. I think, it was the first Bengali film that shot in foreign location

A. Yes, it was. It got the National Award in 1961 as the best film. This film was also selected for entry in the 23rd 'International exhibition of cinematographic art' in Venice in 1962.
Q. Were there similar other records of any other film?
A. Aurora's other biographical film 'Raja Rammohan' was the first Bengali film that got exemption from the amusement tax. Another film 'Raikamal' was invited in 'Berlin film festival' in1956. This film was televisioned there and probably it was the first Indian film that televisioned in foreign. Satyajit Ray's 'Aparajito' got several prizes.I think you know that.
Q. But I read that 'Aparajito' was not produced by Aurora. 'Epic Films' produced it.
A. 'Epic Films' was a partnership company of Ajit Bose, Satyajit Ray and other two or three persons. After the end of this film, during its pre release screening, those people doubted that the film would not run well. They mourned for incurring a loss. Then Ajit Bose paid their money back and took the sole right of that film.
Q. Did all those films run well?
A. Not always. There were some flopped films also.
Q. Why Aurora stopped feature film production from the 1970s?
A, I guess it was due to the market uncertainty. From the 1970s the market became so volatile that Aurora could not take risk. 
Q. Do you think it was the only reason?
A. Definitely not. I think this was the main reason. There are several other reasons also. But I know very little about film business. Better you talk with Anjan Bose. I can only share some of my memories.
Q. Then tell me something about Anadi Nath Bose.
A. He was like my father. Though I hardly talked with him. In my childhood I saw him working at the office of Aurora Cinema Company from morning to 12 noon. Then he used to go his office. He had a horse drawn carriage. In the evening, several people used to come our house, at the office room of Aurora Cinema Company, to discuss with him regarding cinema or theatre.
Q. Did you ever talk with him regarding cinema?
A. No, I did not.
Q. Had Mr. Bose ever directed any film?
No, he did not. His technological knowledge was very poor. He always believed his friends like Devi Ghosh, Charu Ghosh and others. He was a very good organizer. It was his effort to form 'Bengal Motion Picture Association' (BMPA) in1937. He always encouraged others to do something, anything.
Q. Can you point out any drawback of Mr. Bose?
A. Several people took loan from Anadi babu by pawning their equipment but could not pay off. Most of those equipment were very old and ultimately useless. In this way Aurora got several cameras but could not use those for shooting purpose.
Q. Your studio was also built in the same process

A. Once P.C.Barua took loan by mortgaging his studio and could not pay back. Then Aurora claimed it at court and finally we won the case. But according to the order we got very short time, only one night, to occupy those things. At that time Aurora had a huge manpower. Within a night, we could be able to take those all even every brick from Barua studio. Later we built our own studio at Narkeldanga.
Q. You have seen the all three generations of Bose family and their activities. Can you make any difference?
A. They all are very progressive and always looked for a unique identity. Only they implemented different strategies in different time. I think those decisions were according to the change of market. 
Q. Did Ajit Bose implement any new policy for Aurora?
A. Of course. From the 1950s studio system was collapsed. But it was his intellectual support that helped Aurora to survive actively and successfully another twenty years. He was well versed in different subjects. In his time, Aurora achieved a different position in film industry for both, production and distribution of feature films. Those films were identified with elite aesthetic practices over and against popular entertainment. 
Q. And Anjan Bose

A. Anjan Bose is like my son though he is my boss. When he took the charge of Aurora, Bengali cinema was in a crisis. Yet he produced and directed few good documentaries. He got National Award too. But now he is going to do a great job. Very soon there will be another 'Aurora Studio' at Saltlake (Kolkata). This is for the first time Kolkata will get such a modern studio furnished with air-conditioned floor and latest facilities. Anjan already brought two digital cameras and one edit setup. I think, beside rental business, he has a plan to produce digital films in future. After the thirty years' of dormant phase, I hope Anjan will start Aurora again.

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