Maharachi Por (1925)

Influential reformist social about an Untouchable girl who marries a Brahmin. The film draws its influence from a strand of Ibsenite naturalism pioneered on the Marathi stage by playwright Mama Warerkar. Warerkar had, the previous year, made Poona Raided for Deccan Pies, predecessors of United Pies, with Sarpotdar. This was a brief occasion for the convergence of Left progressives with mainstream Hindu reformism, e.g. in the journalism of N.S. Phadke, associate of Sarpotdar and an influence on the Natyamanwantar group (1933, cf K. Narayan Kale). It did not last long, as Sarpotdar's work revealed in its increasing assimilation of Hindu Mahasabha-inspired religious and regional Marathi chauvinism.