It was somewhere in the middle of the hindi movie ‘Khelein Hum Je Jaan Se’ which released few years back, when a bunch of revolutionaries attacked British installations, I glanced over at my wife, who had a proud smile on her face. In fact, the film brought back our patriotism. Based on journalist Manini Chatterjee’s book Do and Die: The Chittagong Uprising 1930-34, the film ‘Khelein Hum Je Jaan Se’ (We played very hard) directed by Ashutosh Gowariker revolves around Surjya Sen, a school teacher of Chittagong, then a district of undivided Bengal (now in Bangladesh) who was the leader of the team of 64 revolutionaries and the mastermind of the April 18,1930 Chittagong uprising. The team included fearless young lady Kalpana Dutta (played by Deepika Padukene), Pritilata Waddedwr (vishakha Singh), Nirmal Sen ( Sikender Kher), Ganesh Ghosh (Samrat Mukherjee), Anant Singh (Mahinder Singh), Ambika Chakraborty (Shreyas Pandit), Loknath Bal (Feroze Wahid Khan).These men and kids sacrificed their lives for the sake of the Mother India. But, these important event wiped out from the history for ever.On that day these bunch of Young men and kids divided into smaller groups and simultaneously attacked important British installations like British armory, post & Telegraph office, railway station,European Club of Chittagong. According to critics, it was a wonderful film because it helped us to rediscover forgotten heroes though the film was a box office failure.
Another film based on the 1930 Chittagong Uprising, directed by former NASA scientist Bedabrata Pain also focused on a teenage boy Jhinku Roy who took part in the uprising. The Manoj Bajpayee starer film Chittagong tried to project one of the glorious chapters of India’s freedom struggle in a totally different perspective.
