''Shree Pundalik'', which was released on 18 May 1912 at the Coronation Cinematograph,

Girgaum Girgaon, or Girgaum, is an area in southern Mumbai in Maharashtra, India. It is near the coast. A section of Marine Drive is located here. See also *Girgaum Chowpatti *Tanks of Bombay Although the tanks have long vanished, the city of Bom ...

Mumbai Mumbai (, ; also known as Bombay — the official name until 1995) is the capital city of the Indian state of Maharashtra and the ''de facto'' financial centre of India. According to the United Nations, as of 2018, Mumbai is the secon ...

, is sometimes considered the first feature-length

Indian film The Cinema of India consists of motion pictures produced in India, which had a large effect on world cinema since the late 20th century. Major centers of film production across the country include Mumbai, Chennai, Hyderabad, Visakhapatnam, ...

by a minority. The government of India and most scholarly sources consider ''

Raja Harishchandra ''Raja Harishchandra'' () is a 1913 Indian silent film directed and produced by Dadasaheb Phalke. It is often considered the first full-length Indian feature film. ''Raja Harishchandra'' features Dattatraya Damodar Dabke, Anna Salunke, Bhal ...

'' to be the first Indian feature film, and detractors argue ''Pundalik'' was only a photographic recording of a popular play. It was produced and directed by

Dadasaheb Torne Ramchandra Gopal Torne () (13 April 1890 – 19 January 1960), also known as Dadasaheb Torne was an Indian director and producer, best known for making the first feature film in India, '' Shree Pundalik''. This historic record is well establis ...

History

''Shree Pundalik'' was a

silent film A silent film is a film with no synchronized recorded sound (or more generally, no audible dialogue). Though silent films convey narrative and emotion visually, various plot elements (such as a setting or era) or key lines of dialogue may, w ...

without dialogue. Torne and his colleagues Nanasaheb Chitre and Ramrao Kirtikar wrote the shooting script. ''Shree Pundalik'' was sent overseas for processing by

. Torne's ''Pundalik'' was about 1,500 feet or about 22 minutes long. The film had a shooting script, was shot with a camera, and its negatives were sent to

London London is the capital and List of urban areas in the United Kingdom, largest city of England and the United Kingdom, with a population of just under 9 million. It stands on the River Thames in south-east England at the head of a estuary dow ...

for processing. Positives were produced and finally released at Coronation Cinematograph,

. The film ran for two weeks.

Debates about the film

Some writers, film critics and historians like Firoze Rangoonwalla, Arnab Jan Deka,

Sanjit Narwekar Sanjit Narwekar (born 8 May 1952) is an Indian documentary filmmaker scriptwriter and author. A 1967 alumni of Bombay Scottish High School, Mumbai, he completed his Bachelor’s in Statistics (1974) and his Master’s in Economics (1976) from the ...

have argued that Dadasaheb Torne was the father of Indian cinema, as his first directed and produced feature film ''Pundalik'' was officially released on 18 May 1912, almost one year before Dadasaheb Phalke's ''

'', released on 3 May 1913. Arnab Jan Deka published a research paper with the title ''Bharatiya Chalachitrar Janak Bhatawdekar aru Torne'' (''Fathers of Indian Cinema Bhatawdekar and Torne'') in the daily newspaper ''Dainik Asam'' on 27 October 1996. Books on cinema like ''A Pictorial History of Indian Cinema'' and ''Marathi Cinema : In Perspective'' support this perspective. However, most scholarly sources agree that ''Raja Harishchandra'', which was released nearly a year later, is more deserving of the title of the first Indian film. Some have argued that ''Pundalik'' does not deserve the honour of being called the first Indian film because it was a photographic recording of a popular Marathi play, and because the cameraman—a man named Johnson—was a British national and the film was processed in London.

Centennial

''Shree Pundalik'' celebrated its centennial on 18 May 2012.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Shree Pundalik 1912 films Indian silent films Indian black-and-white films Filmed stage productions