Meghe Dhaka Tara Page #2

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wails of deep despair...

From the darkest dungeons...

In a speech at the

Berlin Sportpalast...

German propaganda minister

Joseph Goebbels...

declares a total

war against the Allies.

In the Soviet Union,

the Battle of Stalingrad...

comes to an end with

the official surrender...

Mother, give us food, give us food.

Act 1 Scene 4. The court

yard of the village head man.

No no...no way...

Let this bit remain.

I won't sell this bit. Rest of

it is all gone. Won't sell this bit.

They took away all the

paddy luring people with money...

and now they are after our lands!

Tell them, this land is not for sale.

Not for sale?!

How dare you!

You are going back

on your word Mr.Headman,

You are going back !!!

Thrown out from their village,

Kunjo and the Head man...

...descend to make a

home on the Kolkata footpaths.

Act 2 Scene 2.

Make way please. Hey!

Have you got the dole ?

The dole ?

I mean that porridge.

No.

No food.

No clothes.

No roof.

Err.. Mukherjee...

Please try to make her smile.

Just a bit of smile.

Please try... my friend...

Smile !

"Fickle tickle...

What are you doing ?

Let her go. - Leave her!

Then I can name the

photograph Bengal's 'Madonna.'

Leave us alone!

- What's going on here?

Leave us alone! - You cannot

stop our theatre like this!

You cannot stop our

theatre in this way!

Who's there?

Which son of a gun ?

What's all 'this!

This is an unauthorized intrusion.

You can check our registers.

We have orders.

We don't need warrants.

Who is there in this cabin here ?

- Mr. Bagchi.

Nilkantha Bagchi.

Cultural activist. Cabin 3.

Oh !This drunkard

is your inmate too now!

So how come you uniformed

angels are here for...

for a sermon on righteous

living in an asylum?

Waste of time. Let's check

the other cabins. - One minute.

Sister. Com e.

Come. - Come.

You need to pay your way

to see an intellectual in a zoo.

Pay up you bastards!

All your dirty money!

Mr.Bagchi, quiet. Relax!

Please take rest.

So sorry you got disturbed.

What got these f***ers

so prompt today ?

Relax Mr. Bagchi.

They must've postered the

piss walls with death threats again.

So their balls have all shrivelled.

They have information...

...a Naxalite is hiding here...

...disguised as an insane inmate.

Disguise ? Why do you say 'disguise' ?

Only insane people can trade

a bright future outside the country...

...to cleanse the sh*t

holes of their motherland!

Have some water.

Oh my God !

Therefore...

...we got involved.

'We', as in ?

'We' who...

...borrow money for our tea and fags.

...our singing sessions,

our theatre... our squabbles.

There used to be a

cafe in South Calcutta.

Thinker's Paradise.

That's where we used to sit around...

...rebuilding our nation.

We'd talk about change!

And then borrow money to get married.

As in?

Heard about Chandanpiri ? - Yes.

Head it in the paper.

The peasants are up in arms.

Armed uprising!

Our relief team has gone there.

But there is no news of our men...

Mohit, Ramen, Satyabrata, there.

What do we do?

Shoot at sight orders are on.

- Oh no !

Now what Bhoba?

What are the leaders of

People's Theatre Group saying ?

Booking fancy theatre

halls as bullets fly there.

For them it's art for art's sake.

Why will they bother

about the poor farmers?

Damn fools...

Bhoba calm down...

So many events in quick succession...

second Great war...Indian

freedom struggle...

black marketing... famine, riots...

Now its Kakdwip..Telengana...Naval

Mutiny...

The people are seething.

But what does it all indicate ?

What?

Change!

I'm leaving.

Lights !!!

Could you switch them off nurse?

They haven't seen riots...

nor famine...

nor war...

nor death...

fighting within the parliament...

So will the very definition

of revolution change ?

What's that Mohit ?

Writing film songs ?

No...poetry... will you hear them?

Poetry

that's not for me...

Poetry and me are chalk and cheese.

You look frail Bhoba...

...you've changed a lot...

...in the last few years...

You look much older. - Yes.

These days I cough if I raise slogans.

Sudden bouts.

Have a perfumed kerchief guys?

Doctor's diagnosis ?

One side of the river

erodes as the other builds.

One burns so as to illuminate others.

That was the point of our struggle,

right comrade ?

Ketoki is doing great now

as a movie actress Bhoba. So mind it.

Shut up...

...what about you guys?

Running to Bombay for money?

Remember that poem of Salil's ?

Stand by in fields,

forests and towns..

"Stand by in harbours,

woods and grounds...

Do you smell something burning?

- What's wrong?

Aren't you getting

a burning smell ? I am!

What happened?

- Ahalya, Batashi...Sarojini...

Uttami...

...they are all ablaze.

All abaze!

All's aflame.

Bhoba, where are you off to ?

Listen... Bhoba please.

- Bhobha where are you going?

Heard the latest?

Bhoba's run away from home ?

Uncle Bishtu's son Bhoba ?

Who else ?

Wayward lad...

...he's run off to some

place called Kanpur"

...to work in the cotton mills...

...no studies" nothing.

Wait, Bhoba.

Don't leave. - Bhoba, Bhoba!

In the fields, the ports,

the cities and villages" prepare!

Those snuggling in the eternal

darks of their unlit homes.. prepare!

Those with hungry stomachs

and dried up faces...prepare!

This is a call to all the

homes in the land, prepare. Unite!

Our soil belongs to our soiled hands!

Our soil belongs to our soiled hands!

Our soil belongs to our soiled hands!

Endless clouds of unshed rain..

...clinging on to the

skies in dirge despair...

...as they mourned the denied life.

Claiming the child

his right to live...

...no seed raised a tiny head

No butterfly spread

its cocooned wings...

Kakdwip was not the same that night.

Head the poem ?

Was abroad at that time

but have heard about it.

But why were poor farmer's

wives fired upon ?

Because they had freed Kakdwip.

Which ruler tolerates...

free subjects in his rule?

Came to Kolkata...

...for higher studies...

...a defeated poet

like all good Bengali boys.

That smell wafts into the

wards and it's harmful for you too.

We are fire eaters...

...wouldn't have stubbed

it out in those days.

Non conformist ?

Conform where my boy ?

No roots, no encumbrance,

just a homeless refugee boy...

- Sir...

What? - Sir, can we say something?

Sir, Bhushon saw someone burning

up a book and flee last night.

Why.. why burn a book?

After that police raid, may be

they wanted to make the book vanish.

Com plain to the Superintendent.

What will I do ?

Treat the ill or play hide and seek?

What book ?

- We can't read the entire thing.

Piecing the burnt fragments...

' How to be...

...a Good Communist'.

Okay you guys carry on.

I will look in to the matter.

How did you know

the name of the book ?

It was our ABC...

...like learning the alphabets.

Where are you my dear

Boudi (sister in law)?

Here comes your tutor.

He's completely head over heels.

Coming over twice a day to teach.

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