H S Bhatavdekar - The first filmmaker of India

We all know that “Raja Harishchandra” was the first feature film of India. And its maker, Dhundiraj Govind Phalke, popularly known as Dadasaheb Phalke is the Father of Indian cinema. Then why does the heading of the article claim HS Bhatavdekar as the first filmmaker of India?

We need to understand the difference between a Feature film and a non-Feature film. Though there are no distinct definitions, one can understand that Feature films generally tell a story depicted through staged performance by actors. A non-feature can show just about anything. Like a slice of life, a tale from history, a building, an artefact, a

philosophical narrative - the range is endless. In documentaries mostly real life characters are featured. The story is told through voice overs and / or interviews.

What Dadasaheb Phalke made was India’s first Feature film. He picked up the story of the righteous king Harishchandra and all characters were played by actors. This struggle to make the production is legendary. And his name is rightly celebrated. The film was released on April 21st 1913. Bhatavdekar's “The Wrestlers”, the country’s first film, was released in 1899, thirteen years earlier.

So what’s his story? And why don’t most people know about him?

Born in 1868, Bhatavdekar, popularly knows as Sawe Dada, was a Portrait photographer in Mumbai, then Bombay. In 1895, the Lumiere Brothers received lots of praise for the invention, Cinématographe. They came to India with 6 films to be screened at Watson Hotel in Bombay in 1896. Among the audience was Sawe Dada, the young photographer who was mesmerised with watching moving images. The tickets were priced at Re. 1 and the technology was called the “marvel of the century” by

Times of India.

The National Film Development Corporation of India (NFDC) writes in Indian Cinema, a Visual Voyage - “At Lumiere screenings in Bombay was present a local photographer - H S Bhatavdekar (Sawe Dada). He was keen on getting hold of the Lumiere Cinematographe which was the three-in-one apparatus - Camera, Projector and

Processing machine. Bhatavdekar was the first Indian to create moving

image in India.”

The awestruck Sawe Dada went on to procure a Motion Picture Camera from London for 21 Guineas. Armed with that, he went on to create the country’s first film, THE WRESTLERS. It was not a feature film but a short documentary or a factual film, a recording of a wrestling match in Bombay’s Hanging Garden.

Sawe Dada fell in love with reel life and continued to shoot daily lives of his city. He recorded numerous events. And in a short span of 19 years, he shot 120 short films.

In 1902, he documented on cinema the return of the then Minister of Education, R P Paranjpye to India by ship. It was the first Indian news film ever. Later he made “Coronation Durbar” in 1911 that captured the coronation of King George V as the Emperor of India. He made films like Man and Monkey, 1899 (on training of monkeys),

Atash Behram, 1901 (renovation of Parsi Fire Temple), Landing of Sir MM Bhownuggree, 1901 (Life of a British Member of Parliament of Parsi Indian origin) among others.

A century later, the world has moved on. Most people have forgotten him. Yet, the pioneer H S Bhatavdekar who died on 20th February, 1958 left behind an overshadowed legacy.