Investigating the Manifestation of Socio-Political Reflectionin ‘Jagte Raho’ (1956) : A Case Study

Abstract

Upholding an honest and stark poor Villager, ‘Jagte Raho’ despairingly has addressed the issue of social apathy. Set over the events of a single night, the film is a brilliant comic yet critical manifestation of the life of the middle class of the City of Calcutta. The Camera looks at the city as a nightmare. The film narrates the naked truth about various challenges faced by the life in the city, especially for the poor, downtrodden, innocent, honest human beings who enter the city for searching a job to earn two square meals of a day. Every second of the life of a human being is a struggle even if it is for quenching the thirst. A poor peasant coming from the village arrives in the city for search of work. The poor Villager is looking for drinking water to quench his thirst. But he is mistaken as a thief and stumbles into an apartment complex searching for an appropriate hiding place to save him from the grip of a vigilante rowdy mob. In this struggle, he inadvertently exposes the venality and dishonesty of the residents of the apartment complex belong to middle to upper-middle class. The poor Villager eventually is able to leave the apartment complex without getting the required drinking water but finally his thirst is assuaged by a woman. While running away from the vigilante group of young men this poor man discovers closets full of skeletons in the flat of a middle class. A drunk's fetish of making his wife dance to excite him, a so-called respectable man's 'honest living' of producing fake currency, a young boy and girl’s secret romantic effort while the girl's parents become asleep are some of the shocking incidents that the poor Villager notices behind the closed doors on one night. Finally, the poor Villager does an outburst from the frustration that a poor man has faced in a hypocritical society. ‘Jagte Raho’ is one of the exceptional films which have passed the yardstick of the time when it was made and is equally relevant even today. The film with a heart touching narrative, powerful script and variety of meaningful and sensitive songs has provided a deep message to the urban middle and upper-middle class society.