Do Bigha Zameen (1953)
Another Bimal Roy classic ’Do Bigha Zameen’ is one of the most unforgettable films of Indian cinema. The protagonist Shambhu brilliantly played by Balraj Sahni migrates to Calcutta from a small village where he owns two acres of land. He needs to earn money desperately to pay the debt as the moneylender wants his plot of land. His son joins him in the city and becomes a shoeshine boy.
Balraj Sahni becomes a rickshaw puller. The scenes with him pulling people in his rickshaw were so compelling that you felt the anguish and the urgency with which he enacts them. To get into the skin of the character, Balraj Sahni, a well educated westernized actor practiced rickshaw pulling on the streets of Calcutta and mingled
with other rickshaw pullers without telling them who he was. The film explores the cruelty that is meted out to the poor in villages and cities alike. The film wasn’t a big hit but it won major awards at the Cannes film festival, Karlovy Vary film festivals and Filmfare Awards.