Jagte Raho 1956

Jagte Raho is a 1956 Indian Bollywood drama, social film released on Jan 01, 1956. The film is directed by Sombhu Mitra, produced by Raj Kapoor under banner named R. K. Films.

A poor peasant (Kapoor) from the village, who comes to the city in search of work, is looking for some water to quench his thirst. He unwittingly enters an apartment building, whose residents take him for a thief and chase him. He runs from one flat to the other trying to escape his predicament. Along the way, he witnesses many shady undertakings in the flats where he hides. Ironically, these crimes are being committed by the so called "respectable" citizens of the city, who by day, lead a life totally in contrast to their nighttime deeds behind closed doors.

He is shocked by these events, and tries to escape by evading the search parties, that are patrolling the apartment building in search of the elusive thief. He is unfortunately seen, and people chase him to the roof of the building. He puts up a brave resistance, and then descends by the water pipes onto the porch of a flat. He goes in to find a young girl (Daisy Irani). She talks to him and kindles a self belief in the peasant, who determinedly tries to face the adversity waiting outside. But when he ventures out of the flat, he is surprised to find that nobody takes notice of him. He eventually leaves the apartment building, his thirst still unquenched. He hears a beautiful song and searching for its source arrives at the doorstep of a woman (Nargis) drawing water from a well. His thirst is finally assuaged.

Two major figures from the Bengali IPTA, actor-director Sombhu Mitra and composer Salil Choudhary, collaborated with Raj Kapoor on this expressionist effort that became successful only after a 115 version of the film received the main prize at the Kalovy Vary festival in 1957. Kapoor plays a thirsty peasant wandering thorugh Calcutta looking for a drink of water. He breaks into an apartment block but is disvocered and has to dodge the residents, an ingenious narrative device to move the hero from one flat and one milieu to antoher, allowing for a comic yet critical survey of middle-class Bengali life. The film ends with hero searing denunciation of a class that places no value on honesty and a fantasy sequence in which Nargis finally offers him water to the tune of a song hearlding the dawn, Jago ujiyara chhay The British critic Geoff Brown noted: Kapoors character is cut from Chaplins cloth. He starts out sharing food with dog, squatting on the pavement, and spends most of the film acting in pantomime, darting in and out of rooms, hiding in a drum, shinnying down a drainpipe, periodically pursued by a lively crowd residents wielding anything from sicks to strigless tennis racquets. Teh result is one Kapoors most diverting films. *.* Night lay over the city, It was an hour after midnight. . Night lay over the city like a pall of death. And the tall, dark buildings slumbered like huge evil monsters who have swallowed the entire wealth of the country. . In the streets prowled the night watchmen, scaring the occasional innocent passerby with their harsh, piercing cries of "Jagte Raho". Keep Awake! Keep Awake! But the city slept, satiated with sin, drunk with power, over-fed with wealth. Some one needed to be awakened, to be awakened, to be on guard. But Who? . On this dark omiuous night...... A young man from a village in dirty tattered clothes with his unkept shaggy beard and eyes awed and frightened, his lips parched with thirst, was searching for wated in a city that lay wrapped in hard dry stones...... . Looking through the gates of a very big building, he saw water........ dripping from a tap, wasted. He aneaked inside, cupped his hands to have a drink, but before a drop of water had wetted his thirsty lips, suddenly someone shrieked..... Thief! Thief!! . The moment this cry was heard, the sleeping monster of the building came to agitated life.....Hundreds fo windows flew open and in dozens of languages people started shouting...... Thief! Thief!! Catch him. Dont let him go Beat him! Kill him!! . The simple man from the village was in a panic. He must hide himself and quickly.......before he was torn to bits by the infuriated mob. He rushed towards the winding stair-case at the back of the house. . He took refuge in someones bath-room as cries fo "Thief Thief" reverberated throught hte building. Hiding behind a water drum he saw that "Thieves" were already at work there......but it was a peculiar kind of theft. . From one flat to another from one room to the next, he was hunted and pursued, finding himself the unwilling withness of many a peculiar scene......the simple villager saw that wherever he went, some theft, some robbery, some crime was being committed in those abodes of the rich and respecialble. . And thus in that half-night the simple villager silently observed the ways of the city.......he saw that respectability wears a mask, and when the mask is blasted away by the explosion of fear and panic caused by the advent of the thief who was not a thief.......then every one was revealed in his true colours and hideous countenance. . But as this simple, poor young man......who has no name but who is many million men in one......passes throught that dark, frightening fateful night, he emerges with a new understanding and a new faith that the dark night is not the whole truth, but that out of the suffocating darkness itself shall be born the dawn of a new day of truth and justice! Check out this page for more updates on Jagte Raho.