Gauhati Cine Club

The 'Gauhati Cine Club' was founded in the year 1965. Its founders were Dr. Bhupen Hazarika, eminent musician, film-maker, Dadashaheb Phalke Award winner (1992) and present Chairman of Sangeet Natak Academy, Govt. of India; Sri Padum Baruah and Late Phani Talukdar, both were film makers and writers and some other film personalities. It obtained membership of FFSI (ER) and NFAI (Kolkata) in the same year.

There was regular screening in every month since its inception till 1982, besides mini festivals of world cinema, countrywise - European, Asian, North American, South American, Australian and Indian regional films.

During these seventeen years it has organised many seminars and discussions’, which were attended by Marie Seton, Chidananda Dasgupta, Satish Bahadur, Mrinal Sen, Amal Palekar, Dr. John W. Hood and Gasto Roberge. Club has a periodical hi-lingual Journal named “Chitra Chinta” published in both English and Assamese since 1982 although always not regular. We have also some other publications on film & filmmakers.

Average membership, during these years shot up to eight hundred but abruptly came down to less than twenty after 1982 due to six-year long Assam Movement (1979-85), which virtually closed all sorts of business and people stopped movement after Sunset. In such a situation even FFSI stopped supplying films for fear of damage to the prints. The situation was further worsen by the advent of T. V. in the same year. It was further aggravated by the gradual arrival of other audio-visual media in the subsequent years.

Since its inception, office of the club was in rented house. It had a full-fledged office including one library and two 16 mm. projectors. Now all have gone due to the factors mentioned above reducing members to a microscopic few. But the club has survived due to the effort of these microscopic dedicated workers. It has gained momentum since 1995.

Now the club is operating from the house of a office bearer and negotiation is going on with the Government to have a plot of land to construct a Hall cum Office. We have recently owned a LCD Projector of latest model from Panasonic. We have now complete set including wide Screen, Sound system, VCR, DVD and Power supply unit. We now, as far as possible, avoid 35 mm and 16 mm films. Nowadays less preference is given to the 16 mm films.

We normally screen our regular shows in private halls which are not auditorium for performing arts but because of its' easily available and cheap rent. Festivals are held at Government Auditoriums, which are cheaper than commercial theatre. 35 mm pictures are shown at commercial theatres during morning hours. These theatres are costly and too busy to get a suitable date.

In the year 1999, and2001, we arranged a 10 day Film Appreciation Course which were conducted by Prof. Biren Das Sharma of Satyajit Ray Film & Television Institute, Kolkata. Some prominent film director/cameramen/editor from the region were also took part as the resource person In the year 2003 also, we arranged a Film Appreciation Course for the third time, from December 14th, 21st, which were conducted by Prof Biren Das Sharma and Dr. John W. Hood, Film critic & Author from Australia.

26th April is our foundation day. We have arranged to observe "Jyoti Prasad Agarwalla Memorial Lecture" annually on this day on a selected subject related to film from last year besides our other programmes. The first lecture was given by Prof. Apurba Sarma, film critic & writer of Assam on Film and Literature. This was attended by Mr. Bijan Sen Sharma, regional Secretary, FFSI(ER), Kolkata.

Jyotiprasad Agarwalla was the pioneer of Assamese film. He made the fIrst Assamese film "Jaymati" in the year 1935. There are three films in his credit but none is available now. He was poet, dramatist, lyricist and a great composer.

Presently, from the last few years, the club is become regular in screening of films. Regular film shows are being held for atleast four days a month besides some Mini festivals, Retrospectives and festival of world Cinema. In the year 2004, we are organising regular shows in every 2nd Saturday & Sunday and 4th Saturday & Sunday of the month.

At present we have about two hundred members. Annual membership fees are Rs 250/ - for single member, Rs. 300/- for joint member, and Rs. 150/- for students (18 years & above).

(Kanak Ch. Kalita)

Secretary, GCC