Assamese Cinema completes 84 glorious years of existence

Guwahati, March 10, 2019:

Today, Assamese cinema has completed 84 years of existence as it was on this day (10th March) that Rupkonwar Jyotiprasad Agarwala’s ‘Joymoti’, the first Assamese film, was released in Calcutta.

The film was based on Lakshminath Bezbaruah’s play about the 17th-century Ahom princess Joymoti, the film was produced and directed by the noted Assamese poet, author, and film-maker Jyoti Prasad Agarwalla, and starred Aideu Handique and acclaimed stage actor and playwright Phani Sharma. The film, shot between 1933 and 1935, was released by Chitralekha Movietone in 1935 and marked the beginning of Assamese Cinema.

In 1926, Agarwala went to England for higher studies in humanities. But a creative mind like his could not confine itself within the four walls of the classroom for long. He went to Germany and received formal training in production and direction of films in the famous Universal Filmen Akitien Gerehalft Studio.

After coming back to the homeland, he got involved in the freedom movement. He wrote the screenplay of "Joymoti" while in Silchar jail.