Cricket and Tollywood

Cricket, considered as a religion in the Indian subcontinent, has found its way in the Hindi movie industry (commonly known as Bollywood) on numerous occasions. Be it Amir Khan hitting an over boundary of the last ball in a couple of movies, to the introduction of Hrithik Roshan in a multi-starrer, to Harman Baweja (!!)'s career best performance, to the recent Kai Po Che. However, the same cannot be said for the Bengali movie industry, commonly known as Tollywood. Cricket has always been treated as a stepson to Football, while representing sports in Tollywood. How can you imagine the evergreen Mahanayak uttering about cricket -- "ওটা আবার আমি তেমন বুঝি না।" (I don't understand the game very well.) On the other hand, the same person had been seen playing football and winning a match against the British opponents in pre-independent India. Let's look at some of the instances where cricket found its way in Bengali movies.

1) Janmatithi (1957) -- The national award winning movie has a mention of cricket, but in a weird manner. The story revolves around two young runaways from an orphanage. In a particular scene of the movie, they are seen to play cricket with some other boys. Veteran actor Anup Kumar is seen to talk about them to an elderly lady. He mentions them as "Cricket-i-yer", not Cricketer. Am not sure if Bengalis that time used to call Cricketers Cricketiyers or it was a mistake on part of the scriptwritter (maybe the reader can help), but that pronunciation by Mr Kumar was weird, if not, hilarious.

2) Dhonyi Meye (1971) -- This multi-starrer was a big hit for more than one reason. It has everything that a Bengali will love -- Football, Humor, Family Drama, Uttam Kumar. However, director Arabinda Mukherjee played it low on cricket. In one scene, Uttam Kumar goes to visit another gentleman, Nafar Ghosh to ask the latter's daughter's hand for his brother. Uttam Kumar plays the role of a retired footballer in this movie. Nafar and his wife, on the other hand, are interested in cricket. They would go ecstatic on hearing Sobers scoring a century on a radio. Not only has Uttam Kumar uttered the line mentioned by me at the beginning of this article, the portrayal of cricket-loving Bengalis is kind of hilarious, if insulting is a harsh word to use. The Ghosh couple has been portrayed as rich, pretentious, following a not-so-typical Bengali lifestyle, and of course, following cricket. On the other hand, Uttam Kumar's family has all the traits that any Bengali will associate him/herself with and of course, they love Football. Step-son!!!

3) Hansaraj (1976) -- Debut movie of Arindam Ganguly. Arindam plays the role of a young village bard, who has the unique ability to create songs on any event, instantly. When a cricket team from Kolkata comes to play in their village, Hansraj is amazed to see such a weird game being played. He, of course, takes few minutes to create a song describing the game of cricket in detail. You can listen to the song here:

4) Swopno (2006) -- Times have changed, and since 1983, cricket has been established as a religion in India. Prosenjit, therefore, backs his brother, Jishu Sengupta to pursue the career of a "Cricket-i-yer". Jishu ultimately makes it to the Indian team. With the betting scandal around, Jishu gets entrapped and accepts bribe to lose a match. Prosenjit, of course, being the righteous man, as he is always since his debut as an adult in Duti Pata (1985), can not tolerate this and nearly has a heart attack seeing his motherland lose. However, none other than the Bengal Tiger, Sourav Ganguly, comes in to rescue. He singlehandedly plays a superb innings to lead India to victory. This, IMO, is the only complete cricket-dominant movie in Tollywood. To be noted: Sourav didn't act in this movie. Some of his over boundaries from 1999 Taunton and 2000 Nairobi were used.

5) Le Chakka (2010) -- This is an ideal example to show that Tollywood has now changed it's stepson. This movie could have been ideal if Football was the bet; since this movie started with the eternal clash of Ghoti and Bangal. However, director Raj Chakraborty thought otherwise. Well, a South Kolkata (read modern, stylish) lad (Dev) moves to a North Kolkata (read archaic, useless) para (locality). The local guys have cricket club which ensures the last position in any competition they participate. Dev, on the other hand, is a renowned fast bowler. Politicians (eternal villains) play a devious plot to eradicate the club. Dev must not only play with 10 useless guys to rescue the club, he also has to ensure his love-story doesn't get disturbed. Cricket, definitely, plays a major role in this movie.

6) Cholo Paltai (2011) -- Prosenjit again. This time he is against cricket. His teenager son wants to become a Sachin or Sourav, while he wants the lad to pursue the career of a doctor or an engineer. A violent clash ensures his son falls into coma and become permanently paralyzed. How his son is rescued and how Prosenjit fights (by wearing a belt of time-bombs on his visit to the Chief Minister!!) forms a different part of the story. Sambaran Banerjee had a guest appearance in this movie.

At present, I can not think of any other Bengali movie where cricket was mentioned/an integral part. I will really appreciate if the readers can point to any movie names I missed.