Filmindia (1941)

Stop This lUaste Of Public money. Film Hduisory Board IHust Be Overhauled. Enough Of This Dictatorship. By. BABDRAO PATEL. On the 27th January I was "invited" by the Deputy Commissioner of the C.I.D. and shown certain papers belonging to the Film Advisory Board and warned that in the event of my publishing the said papers in toto or any extracts therefrom, I would make myself liable under the Defence of India Rules, as it was considered, naturally by the officer, that such publication would interfere with the war effort of the Government of India. On enquiring from the officer whether this action was being taken at the instance of the Film Advisory Board, he did not commit himself to any definite reply. After subsequent enquiries I found out that the said action was inspired by the Government representative on the Film Advisory Board. If this is true I cannot understand why such an obsolete and time-worn procedure was adopted to warn me. It is already accepted that at the end of such warnings there is often the jail waiting for those who refuse to take up the mild hint. But has the jail any terrors left for any nationalist? This action seems to have been taken over and above the heads of the other members of the Film Advisory Board who confessed complete ignorance of the whole thing when questioned. It would have been a good procedure if the Chairman at least had been consulted before reporting the matter to the police as the Government would then have got one more opportunity of saying that it was with the "unanimous" approval of the members ;yt' the Board, several of Wh9m ai'e leading Indian producers and distributors. I am a militant nationalist and do not believe In passive resistance nor do I belong to any policy or party ticket. I am one of those millions in India whose approach to the problem of Indian freedom is individual and who believe in doing their This is how the hride Kalyaiii steps out in "Prabhat" a Tarun picture. bit to attain the goal of freedom in as constitutional a way as is possible under the present circumstances. I feel, and sincerely, that grjtain must y^ixi \iii§ Yf?if m\ m?!"? Mr. Desmond Young, the Chief Press Adviser to the Government o{ India, is mainly responsible for the affairs of the Film Advisory Board, as they are to-day. ly for her own sake but also for the sake of other subjugated nations of the world. Firstly because the evil that faces us as an alternative in the event of Britain losing the war is too terrible to imagine an.d secondly because I feel that it will be easier for us to settle our quarrel of freedom after the war with the British whom we know for 150 years and know too well Iheir good and bad points. Purely therefore from the selfish point of view of a man who believes that his country should be free from the yoke of foreign domination as soon as possible, I am prepared to contribute all my efforts witli tlie others in the field to help Britain to win this war soon. Sooner she docs so. sooner shall the Indians be able to revive their own struggle for freedom. THE FILM ADVISORY BOARD With this preamble I proceed to criticise the activities of the Film Advisory Board with one solitary object in view and that is that its working should be so efficiently organised that its efforts may contribute solidly towards winning the war for the Allies. The Film Advisory Board was formed on the 4th of July 1940 by Mr. Desmond Young, Chief Press Adviser to the Government of India. lis first personnel \ya§ nominated