Uttarakhand’s Dev Bhoomi (Land of the Gods) Cinema still in Jagwal

Abstract

Cinema’s one of the inventive feature is the regional cinema. The world regional cinema has a vast expansion just like the landscape. Before discussing the aspects of regional cinema, especially the Uttarakhandi cinema, as a scholar one must understand the cinema first.

Just like the mainstream cinema which evolved in order to satiate the human will to speak through various mediums the regional cinema came alive because of the adulation for the dialects/language concerned with the respective regions.

The Uttarakhandi cinema saw its film chronicle on 3 May, 1983 in Jagwal by Parashar Gaur. The response was tremendous and the film’s release in Delhi was a shock wave by witnessing the turn on of the viewers in such a great number and the success of the film in a city which had never estimated and calculated the great number of Uttarakhandis then called Pahadis. This film not only left film critics, anthropologists surprised but the sociologists and political groups were also left baffled which eventually helped in lifting the not so cared spirit of the people.

This period had also seen rise of other regional cinemas like Haryanvi; though it was not so fortunate to have a big bang like Jagwal yet these regional cinemas were witnessing conglomeration of various set of people. They were endeavoring to start new projects in the hope of making new feats which unfortunately were not materialized because the films were low budgeted experiments founded on more on enthusiasm than practical wisdom.¹