Sant Tukaram
About Sant Tukaram
In seventeenth-century Dehu, the farmer Tukaram turns from trade after a famine kills his first wife and child, and his second wife Jijai is left with the household. The Brahmin Salomalo accuses the lower-caste poet of stealing verses. Pandit Rameshwar Shastri orders the manuscripts thrown in the river. After a thirteen-day fast the pages return, Shivaji becomes a disciple, and Tukaram leaves in a chariot while Jijai stays with the children.
Cast & crew
More about Sant Tukaram
Vishnupant Govind Damle and Sheikh Fattelal directed it for Prabhat. V. Shantaram is credited as producer. Keshavrao Bhole wrote the music and V. Avadhoot photographed it. It opened on 12 December 1936.
Themes
Background
The 5th Venice festival screened it in 1937, the first Indian film shown at an international festival.
In film history
It tells the life of the Varkari poet Tukaram (1608–1650) in Marathi, against a Brahmin claim that a Shudra may not handle the scriptures.
Making
Prabhat cast the stage performer Vishnupant Pagnis, not a film star, as the saint. The film is in Marathi.
Audiences
It ran 57 weeks in one theatre and was reported seen by 6 million people in Maharashtra.
Look
V. Avadhoot photographed the Dehu story, including the river fast and the final chariot.
Music
Keshavrao Bhole composed the score, built around Tukaram's abhangs.
Preservation
A print is held in connection with the National Film Archive of India. The Venice citation paper was reported recovered in Pune and deposited there in 2004.
Notes
- Vishnupant Pagnis plays Tukaram. Gauri plays Jijai, also called Awali. Sri Keshav Sitaram Bhagwat plays Salomalo.
- The miracles shown include grain falling from the sky, a sick boy cured, and an army formed from an image of Vithoba.
- A Venice citation paper was reported found in 1974 in a bin on Law College Road in Pune and handed to the National Film Archive of India on 23 March 2004.
- In 1982 it was shown again at Venice, with the Prabhat film Duniya Na Mane, for the festival's fiftieth year.
Awards
- Named one of three films of special distinction at the 1937 Venice Film Festival, with Maria Nover (Hungary) and Flying Doctor (Australia)
Scenes
- Tukaram sits thirteen days by the river after his manuscripts are ordered thrown in.
- Shivaji offers gifts and is refused.
- Jijai will not board the chariot because the children remain.
