1950s, The mark of a nation

 

 

Perhaps it couldn’t have been more symbolic than this. India had just done away with the yoke of the British rule. Pandit Nehru had formed his first government and traffic lights were being installed for the first time in New York City. In Madras, the Indian cricket team recorded its first Test victory against a country that had only five years ago vacated Indian soil. Later that year at Lord’s, an Indian cricket legend was to be born by the name of Mulvantrai Himmatlal Mankad, popularly known as Vinoo Mankad. He scored 72 and 184 and bowled 73 overs in the England first innings to take five for 196. Though India could not win that match, the Test is famously known as Mankad’s Test. Mankad had become the first Indian in 30 years to score a century. Mankad had earlier been at the centre of the controversy in 1947-48 when during India’s tour of Australia, he broke the wicket during his run-up while the batsman at that end was out of the crease. Another pillar of India’s middle order would also rise during that time.



Top films

Awaara (1951);

Do bigha zameen (1953)

Jhanak jhanak payal baaje (1955)

Mother india (1957)

Do aankhein barah haath (1957)

Pyaasa (1957)

Chalti ka naam gaadi (1958)



Cricket events

First test victory against england 1952

Series win against new zealand 1956

Vinoo mankad hits 231 runs against new zealand at madras. establishes, with pankaj roy, a world record opening partnership of 413 runs

Polly umrigar’s 223 against new zealand becomes the first double century scored for india 1955-56 Polly Umrigar, a burly six-footer, scored a crucial 130 that led India towards winning its first Test. In 1952, India would also win its first Test series against its own life blood Pakistan. This was the year when a song from a Raj Kapoor film would be sung in faraway lands of the Soviet Union, Turkey and Africa. 1952 also saw a young girl being selected as a beauty queen in the first ever Miss India contest. Nutan went a long way, carving out an entire gamut of meaningful roles in the Hindi film industry. A year after India recorded a series win against New Zealand, in 1956, Mehboob Khan’s Mother India became the first Indian film to be nominated at the Oscars. This was the time when Prime Minister Nehru spoke of building ‘modern temples of India.’ Cities were attracting rural masses for employment opportunities they provided. But concerns were also being raised about the cultural decline such economic changes could bring about. In that sense Mother India portrayed the rural scenario as the true Indian scenario. After all, it was not very long ago that Mahatma Gandhi had said that real India lived in its villages. In 1957, Pyaasa, a treatise on individual struggles of post-Independent India hit cinemas. The film, directed by legendary Guru Dutt, was rated as one of the best 100 films of all times by Time. The Angry Young Man of India cinema was still unheard of. Cricketers had no brands to stand for except their nation. Politicians were still spinning cotton. India was trying hard to leave a mark. It would take decades before it managed to. But by that time, politics would turn into a multicrore enterprise.