JUGNU (1947) — Triumph of a tragedy amidst turmoil of Partition and societal cynicism
Making of a star……
“Jugnu was released in late 1947. The film became a hit and the hoardings were put up in many places, including a site near Crawford Market. One morning while Aghaji was supervising the unloading of a consignment of apples at his wholesale shop in the market, Raj’s grandfather, Basheshwarnathji, walked in and the two greeted each other warmly as always. They had been friends for years and Aghaji used to tell him jokingly that it was no use twirling his impressive moustache because his son and grandson were in the acting business. That morning Basheshwarnathji had a naughty smile playing beneath his moustache. He twirled his moustache and told Aghaji he had something to show him: something that would take his breath away. Aghaji must have wondered what it could be. Basheshwarnathji took him out of the market and showed him the large hoarding of Jugnu right across the road. He then said: ‘That’s your son Yousuf.’ Aghaji told me later on that he could not believe his eyes for a moment but there was no mistaking me for someone else because the face he knew so well was printed large and the blurb on the hoarding was hailing the arrival of a bright new star on the silver screen. The name was not Yousuf. It was Dilip Kumar.”
— “The Substance and the Shadow- An Autobiography” by Dilip Kumar
“Jugnu”, directed and produced by Shaukat Hussain Rizvi, told the story of a group of frivolous, joyous, and spirited group of college students. The girls and the boys, studying in separate colleges situated on the same premise, do not miss an opportunity to engage in youthful, yet friendly confrontation with each other. Suraj (Dilip Kumar) and Jugnu (Noor Jehan) amidst this friendly skirmish fall in love with each other. They vow to stay together for the rest of their lives. But Suraj’s family has some other plans for him. They reject Jugnu who is an orphan. Seemingly, Suraj’s family was very rich but in reality, inherently, they were deeply in debt. They plan to marry Suraj off to a girl belonging to a wealthy and prosperous family anticipating a hefty dowry, thereby lessening their financial woes. Sacrifices, miscommunications, and misunderstandings lead to such a situation that Jugnu and Suraj fall apart, ignorant of the truth. The truth, though revealed by the end, eventually drives the two lovers toward their fatal ends.
Savage reviews……
JUGNU was received with much euphoria. The general public loved the film. Amidst the hype and hoopla around the film, there was also sharp critique about the film flowing in from various corners, especially the urban elite. Baburao Patel, the famous film critic, came out with a savage review of the film in his film magazine FilmIndia. The review was titled “Jugnu, A Dirty, Disgusting, Vulgar Picture! Students and Colleges Slandered!”. Patel wrote, “Shaukat Hussain Rizvi, of whose educational and cultural attainments nothing is known, tells us in Jugnu that college life in India is nothing more than a long sex hunt in which boys chase girls, explore their handbags, rob their tiffin boxes and sing suggestive love ditties while making vulgar gestures; while girls sigh about heavily, seduce boys to tea, pimp for their friends, puncture their cycle tires and sing songs of frustrated love.” Patel calls Noor Jehan “a fat, oversized woman, mother of several kids”, tries to equate Shaukat Hussain Rizvi with Kasim Rizvi (a separatist leader from Hyderabad) and blasts the censor board for being “a crowd of so many moonstruck boobies who, after seeing a picture, do not realise its anti-social and slanderous contents which give us an ugly and distorted picture of our educational institutions to the world in general….”.
Even many readers of the magazine FilmIndia shared their concerns about the film and its derogatory content in their letters sent to the editor. A reader M P Bhatia from New Delhi wrote, “It is not understood as to when our popular government would get real sense and save the masses from complete demoralisation…..One more proof of the ability of our censors is given when they allowed the exhibition of the film “Jugnu” with a vulgar song sung by a female college student…”. Another reader A M Vishwanath from Madras wrote, “In Jugnu there is a filthy nude dance by a girl student of a college……Do the censors think that our college girls are no better than courtesans?”.
Morarji to “Moralji”: Ban and eventual censorship…….
It so happened that before publishing his review of Jugnu, Baburao Patel had sent a copy to Morarji Desai, the then Home Minister of the Government of Bombay. Reportedly, Morarji Desai watched the movie on 26th October 1948, and thereafter on 29th October he ordered a ban on the film in the state of Bombay. The other provincial government followed suit. The producer and distributors cried foul. They called the ban “drastic, ill-conceived, arbitrary, and ruinous” because it had already been cleared by the members of the Bombay Board of Film Censors. People even funnily distorted Morarji’s name in the press and started addressing him as “Moralji”. Baburao Patel, being the foremost person to draw the attention of the government to the Jugnu, also bore the brunt. He writes in one of his editorials, “Producers, distributors and exhibitors heaped a million Diwali abuses on me. Some of them roped in my long-forgotten ancestors of whom I have personally lost link.”. Left with no choice, the distributors had to resubmit the film for re-censoring and when the final censor-passed print came out, it was just about half an hour shorter than the original.
Jugnu becomes a big hit……
Jugnu had a scattered release all over the country. The film was completed before the partition and as per some sources it was also released in a few territories like Karachi just before the independence. The major release of the film happened only after the country gasped through the dreaded partition with the formation of Pakistan. Coincidentally, Noor Jehan along with her husband Shaukat Hussain Rizvi decided to settle down in newly formed Pakistan, while Dilip Kumar stayed back in India. Irony of fate? Maybe. Despite all cynicism, controversies, bans, and censorship Jugnu was warmly embraced by the masses across territories in the sub-continent. The tragic end of the two lovers in the film might have touched somewhere deep in the hearts of the people of the country, which was trying to recuperate from a bigger tragedy of division and displacement. Jugnu went on to become the highest-grossing film of 1947 and it also catapulted Dilip Kumar into an overnight star.
“Dilip Kumar looks the average college boy……He tries to do his bit but he does not match well with Noor Jehan. Dilip, however, speaks his dialogue well.”, wrote Baburao Patel.
