The Hindu Business Line : The fine prints

Long live the queen! This poster of Jhansi ki Rani is among the proud possessions of the National Film Archive of India, Pune. The 1953 film was directed and produced by Sohrab Modi and starred his wife Mehtab in the lead role.

Alka Kshirsagar

The National Film Archive of India (NFAI), in Pune, plays custodian to a significant slice of India’s film legacy. Some 17,000 films covering 6,000 titles, the oldest being Dadasaheb Phalke’s 1913 production Raja Harishchandra, currently lie in its 20 vaults. You could rightfully call this a goldmine of the country’s cinematic heritage.

That this is a goldmine is something that several producers and copyright owners have discovered of late. Instances of prints (that have been painstakingly preserved for years, and perhaps been restored at considerable cost to the national exchequer) being borrowed for commercial exploitation are on the rise. Unfortunately, while the producers/legal heirs/copyright owners make financial gains, the agency that preserves these gems, very often spending lakhs on restoration, gets no share of the returns.

Since April 2008, there have been nearly 40 cases of prints — including Marathi classics like Chhatrapati Shivaji, Mohitenchi Manjula and Saadhi Manse — being lent out to copyright owners, who are free to exploit their commercial potential. There are eight instances of providing basic material for special restoration and negative copying, and another six requests are pending. The avenues for commercial application are many; from making prints for theatre screenings, tele-cine copies for broadcast on the small screen to converting into VCDs or DVDs for sale.

A pittance as fee

Cinema vault: Film reels await scrutiny at the National Film Archive of India, Pune; (right) a film undergoes technical checks on a Steenbeck viewing machine. K. NIKHIL

On its part, the NFAI charges a mere Rs 100 for each reel (16 reels make an average length film) lent out but does not enjoy even a minor share of the short-term or long-term proceeds of the entire transaction that may run into thousands of rupees.

Besides, there are no guarantees on the condition in which the material may be returned.

Aarti Singh, a film lover, puts it bluntly when she says, “The system is often misused. The film has been stored in a public facility at no cost to them. They access it as and when required to make prints, while the NFAI takes pains and spends public money for their storage, preservation and restoration in order to protect national heritage.”

How the films arrive

To put things in perspective, each film that lies in those commodious vaults has a unique tale to tell of how it came to be there. Some were actively acquired with a budget at its disposal, while others were handed over for preservation by the producers themselves.

But there are several movies which land up under less auspicious circumstances; rescued from railways depots, which dub them as lost property after consignees fail to show up for months to claim them (the latest consignment consists of 900 individual parcels).

Amongst films that arrived this way are Swades, Devdas, Sarkar, LOC and Rog to name a few. There is also Raakh (1988), starring Aamir Khan, which was recently acquired from the Customs department, where it had been lying after it was confiscated!

Huge running cost

Not surprisingly, films exposed to the vagaries of nature as they lie unclaimed in remote railway godowns are frequently in appalling condition. They require hours of laborious work to sort and ascertain the quality of both the film and its soundtrack. Restoration often calls for lakhs of rupees. To top it all, there is the running cost of storing them in conditions of rigorously controlled temperature and humidity.

“Every film that comes here has to be scrutinised and, if necessary, restored. Restoration through software is the least expensive, but even that can range between Rs 8 lakh and 10 lakh per film,” explains Director Vijay Jadhav.

As for storage cost — colour films at 2 degrees Celsius and 20 per cent humidity; and black-and-white at 15 degrees Celsius and 50 per cent humidity — the monthly electricity cost alone works to Rs 5 lakh. And, of course, there is the intangible cost of man-hours spent and toil involved in this process.

Jadhav admits there is a loophole in the prevailing system and it needs an overhaul. “I hope to formulate a comprehensive policy on the issue which aims at better preservation and protecting the interests of the Government,” he says.

Work in progress

Recently, the NFAI completed documenting and digitising 1.33 lakh photographs (stills), 15,000 large posters and as many movie-song booklets. It has now undertaken a project to restore around 150 films, and has Rs 30 crore at its disposal. According to an estimate, the NFAI will require nothing less than Rs 500 crore to restore and digitalise some of the films in its possession and achieve its target of acquiring the 1,000 best films in the country. Changing the terms of lending for the treasures stored here could provide the much needed financial resource and give this valuable endeavour a definite leg-up.

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