The 1976 Ramon Magsaysay Award for Journalism, Literature and Creative Communication Arts

BIOGRAPHY of Sombhu Mitra

SOMBHU MITRA was born in Calcutta, India, on August 22,1915, the sixth child of three sons and four daughters born to Sarat Kumar Mitra, an employee of the Geological Survey of India, and Satadalbasini Mitra. His mother died when he was 12 years old. MITRA remembers his father as a silent man—as his father had been before him. Under his father's strict upbringing he and his siblings were forbidden even to attend a theater. However, while a schoolboy in Calcutta at the Chakraberia Middle English School and the Ballygunge Government School, SOMBHU read plays written in Bengali and was active in school dramatics. It was not until he started college in 1931 at St. Xavier's in Calcutta that he was able, surreptitiously, to attend the theater.

In later years, MITRA says, he has mused about why with this background, he chose the theater for his profession. He does not recall feeling rebellious about his father's embargo for he had school dramatics and in college found ways to attend the theater. Neither does the pleasure he took in participating in school plays and seeing a few others seem to have been an overriding impulse. Unable to think of an event, a person "or even an idea" which led him to make this choice he puts it down to an instinct he cannot define.

MITRA began his acting career in 1939 at the age of 24 at the Rungmahal Theater in Calcutta, and moved from there to the Minerva, Natyaniketan and Srirangam theaters. During the early days of his career he came into contact or acted with many of India's finest performers—Sisir Kumar Bhaduri, Ahindra Chowdhury, Naresh Mitra and Manoranjan Bhattacharjee—but the theater in Bengal, and throughout India, was at a low point.

India has a more than 2,000-year tradition of dance, dance drama and folk drama based on religious beliefs, rites and mythology, but modern theater was introduced into Bengal by British traders in the 17th and 18th centuries. This introduction, however, did not take root for it was English theater performed for the entertainment of the English-speaking foreign community. Creative Bengalis became acquainted with the Western form only when Gerashim Lebedeff, a Russian trader, in the late 18th century coauthored with a Bengali the first modern Bengali play. Lebedeff also built a theater where modem Bengali plays could be presented and wrote a Bengali-English grammar. As British India's capital from 1833 to 1912, Calcutta was the center of theatrical activity, not only for the British but for the Indians as well, and Bengal, among all the regions of the country, was the one where the Western theater form was accepted and matured most rapidly. Indian plays and numerous English plays, including Shakespeare, were performed by Indian actors. After the turn of the century, even though Calcutta had grown tremendously, with a rising middle class and an increasing number of English educated Indians, the theater declined. There was a scarcity of outstanding actors to replace the giants of the late 19th century—Girish Ghosh, Ardhendu Mustafi and the actress Binodini Dasi. In the 1920s Sisir Kumar Bhaduri ushered in a revival; formerly a lecturer in English, he formed his own company and several of his productions were hailed as marking a new era in Bengali theater. Bhaduri was a very good actor and a good director, and created a number of fine actors and actresses as well. Yet, by the 1930s, the commercial offerings were characterized by a lack of imagination and reliance on old plays, sentimental family stories, musicals and mythological melodramas. The advent of films did nothing to encourage new directions within the theater.

Even the existence of plays written by Rabindranath Tagore—the 1913 Nobel Prize winner for literature and India's greatest poet—did not revive the theater from its doldrums. Tagore readily gave permission for the production of his plays but he often disapproved of the ways in which they were handled even by his own fellow Bengalis, and it soon became widely accepted that his plays were next to impossible to perform.

Dissatisfied with the stereotyped dramas of the time, MITRA left the commercial stage after a couple of years even though he was already developing a reputation as an excellent actor. In 1943 he joined the Anti-Fascist Writers' and Artists' Association. This was a turning point in his life. He became an active member of the theater section, which later became a separate organization called Bharatiya Gananatya Sangha, or Indian Peoples’ Theater Association (IPTA).

IPTA was born during the turmoil in India caused by the movement for independence from British colonial rule and the Second World War. By 1937 the nonviolent strategy of Mahatma Gandhi had forced the British to agree to a limited amount of self-government, but the experience was bittersweet as the confrontations in Europe exploded into World War II. As the war progressed two unconnected developments had a crucial impact upon the fortunes of Indian theater.

In 1941 Germany attacked the Soviet Union. Entry of the Soviets into the war on the side of Britain caused a crisis of conscience for many because, mixed with aversion for the imperialism which the British represented, there was much sympathy for socialism. On the cultural level, unlike the political level, there was some cohesiveness of outlook. While it is not clear whether IPTA was created because of a directive from the Communist Party of India or because of strong feelings of unity among the intellectuals and artists, it is clear that IPTA drew an impressive cross section of the most talented and progressive people. Many who were to enrich the cultural life of India for years to come—Ravi Shankar, the world renowned musician; Shanti Bardhan, the innovative choreographer; the dancers Sachin Mukkerjee and Narendra Sharma; and Balraj Sahni, Hemanta Mukkerjee and Salil Chowdhury, all big names in films—were members. Novel and exciting at the time, IPTA encouraged its members to reach out to the broad masses of people and supported the production of folk dramas and the study of folk forms. IPTA began on a quiet note. But then a famine in Bengal in 1943, which was essentially man-made and resulted in the death of a reported three million people, sent a wave of horror throughout India. Thousands of starving peasants streamed into Calcutta from the suffering countryside, and MITRA saw firsthand the common sight of people begging for just the water in which rice had been boiled. IPTA seized upon the event: scores of singers, dancers and actors—including MITRA—traveled around the country to raise funds to aid the famine stricken region.

In October and November of 1944 IPTA put on Nabanna (Harvest Festival). This four-act play by Bijon Bhattacharya, a playwright and one of the earliest members of IPTA, was written in reaction to the famine. MITRA and the author produced the play, with both of them playing roles—the author's role was "very important," MlTRA adds, and "he was great in it." Nabanna tells about the life of Bengali peasants during this harrowing period. Ground down by poverty, the characters are also victims of the human greed around them. Getting its name from the final scene in which the harvest festival takes place, the play ends on a note of hope and belief in the collective strength of the peasantry. It was produced not only in the Bengali language but also in Hindi and was made into a film. Its success was overwhelming and its impact on Indian theater phenomenal.

Nabanna is clearly a landmark in the history of Indian theatrical activity. It was the first time since Dinabandhu Mitra's play Nildarpan (lit. "blue mirror" but spoken of in English as The Tale of Indigo Planters) was produced in the 1870s, that a truly peasant drama had come to the Bengali stage. Nildarpan, which dealt with the crushing exploitation of the indigo plantation workers by their British masters, is considered the first play of social protest in Bengali literature. On at least one occasion the play had to stop in mid-act because of the outrage of the primarily British audience when a peasant worker attacked a white planter who was going to rape an Indian woman; it was eventually banned by the British government. The Dramatic Performance Control Act of 1876, passed purportedly to control obscenity, was actually aimed at censoring plays such as Nildarpan that exposed foreign misrule. The Act put a lid on the further creation of Indian plays with a social conscience until Nabanna burst forth on the scene.

Nabanna had a stunning impact on viewers because the traditional heroes of Indian drama were replaced with famine-, strife-ridden village folk. The language of the play, in keeping with the characters, was another departure from tradition; for the first time village dialect was used throughout to dramatize the social reality. MITRA also broke away from elaborate staging and used an extremely simple set with a plain jute cloth backdrop and against this silhouettes—a technique then still new in Indian theater. He introduced a distinctive choreography and stage composition, using silences in dramatic moments and disjointed significant small scenes put together in epic form. His use of sound effects was imaginative and startling, but perhaps the most noteworthy aspect of the play was the flawless acting. At the time of its production it was said that never before had theatergoers seen the production of a director like MITRA who had such insight into and mastery of all the details that go into a performance.

Although the theme was a "non-popular" one, Nabanna played seven consecutive sellout nights at the Srirangam Theater in Calcutta—an extraordinary occurrence at the time. But the commercial theater owners, nervous that such success would draw business away from more traditional theatrical productions, refused to rent out theaters for future performances; MITRA was to face this same resistance on the part of commercial theater owners over and over again. Nabanna, however, continued to be performed on makeshift stages before large audiences in the countryside as well as in the city.

With the end of the war in August 1945 and the independence of India in August 1947 IPTA soon became, quite clearly, an arm of the Communist Party of India and dogmatism began to characterize its work. By 1948 MITRA felt that he could no longer belong to an organization which confused drama and the arts with political ideology, and he, like many others, resigned.

The success of Nabanna, however, had convinced him that there was need for an independent group which would perform serious drama. His house on Nasiruddin Road in Calcutta had become the favorite gathering place for a coterie of actors. Inspired by his good friend and mentor Manoranjan Bhattacharjee, he formed them into a non-commercial drama troupe. Bhattacharjee, whom MITRA describes as "a grand, wise old man of the theater," was called The Great Sage in theatrical circles after playing in the 1920s the role of the poet Valmiki, who wrote the ancient classic Ramayana, in Sisir Kumar Bhaduri's production Seeta (the wife of King Rama in the saga). Organized informally in 1948, and formally in 1950, the new group was given by Bhattacharjee the name Bohurupee, meaning "many, many forms, " which MITRA felt accurately summed up the role of the actor.

The troupe, which started out with 15 actors, many of whom have remained, could barely survive during its early years; MITRA’s erstwhile friends in IPTA "considered him a renegade and refused to help him." Bohurupee had little money for sets and members of the troupe, of necessity, divided their time between acting and outside paying jobs. However, while other "little theater" groups came and went, Bohurupee has lasted more than 25 years, primarily because MITRA has always put an emphasis on perfection and creativity, and has shown a willingness to tackle serious, thought-provoking social dramas. His pioneering in this respect has encouraged other groups throughout India to experiment and become bolder in their efforts.

The early years were also financially difficult, personally, for MITRA and his wife Tripti, whom he had met when they were both members of IPTA and had married in 1945. Tripti, herself an actress of great talent, has frequently performed with her husband in Bohurupee productions. Their daughter Snaoli, born during their struggling days when they thought at times they could not afford to keep her, is a student and a promising actress of the stage and screen.

The only way MITRA and his wife were able to survive during the first years of Bohurupee's existence was to act in occasional films (some under director Paul Zils); they both eventually became well-known screen performers. MITRA also tried his hand at film directing. In 1945-1946 he co-directed the film Dharti-ke-laal (Children of the Earth) and in 1955 he jointly wrote and directed the film Jagte Raho (Under Cover of Night) with Amit Moitra. This film, produced in Hindi and Bengali (under the title Ek din Raatre), won the Karlovy Vary Grand Prix in Czechoslovakia in 1957. The last film he directed was Shuva Bibaha (Happy Wedding) in 1959.

MITRA could have settled for a successful and financially secure career as a movie actor/director, but his real love was the theater and especially Bohurupee. He was adamant about the independence of his group and he refused to permit financial support from outside interests or patrons—the traditional means of sustaining non-professional dramatic groups in India. Although an offer came to be director of Delhi's National School of Drama he turned it down to devote himself to Bohurupee.

The early productions of Bohurupee established the precedents by which all future performances by that troupe and other troupes have been judged. Meticulous preparation and control characterized the performances. Not even minor details were neglected. One of the first plays MITRA produced was Pathik (The Traveler) by Tulsi Lahiri which was later made into a film by Devaki Bose with members of the Bohurupee troupe. Like Nabanna, Lahiri's plays have a social message for he wrote of the misery of the poor and the downtrodden. With the performance of Pathik and Chhenra Taar (Broken String), also by Tulsi Lahiri, during Bohurupee's First Festival of Plays in 1950-1951, the troupe caught the eye of critics and theatergoers. In 1951 the group produced their first Tagore play, Char Adhyay (Four Chapters). MITRA had to overcome the old attitude toward performing Tagore's plays but won the troupe over by demonstrating that Tagore's lines had dramatic meaning when handled as earthy conversation rather than as a poetic recitation unrelated to real characters in a drama. Proving with this successful production that a Tagore play not only was possible to perform but had a contemporary quality with which audiences could identify, the troupe firmly secured its position of preeminence in the nonprofessional theater.

As the director of Bohurupee MITRA has offered an original combination of classical and contemporary, Western and Indian plays. Some of his outstanding work has been with Western plays. Yet his productions have differed from the traditional approach which was to produce them in the original version. MITRA was very aware of the different heritages of the authors of those plays and that of his Indian audience; therefore he adapted the plays so that they would be meaningful within the Indian cultural context.

In his adaptation of Ibsen's A Doll's House (Putulkhela in Bengali) the Norwegian original is transposed into the Bengali idiom. Nora Helmer, who comes home from a shopping spree to be chided by her normally indulgent husband becomes, in MITRA's version, Bulu. The husband, Torvald, who does not realize that his wife is secretly paying off a debt incurred to save his life, becomes Tapan. The clerk, Nils Krogstad, from whom Nora borrowed the money, becomes Keshto. As in Ibsen's play the husband finally becomes aware of the loan, reacts with anger and concern only for himself, and the play ends with t heroine leaving her "doll's house" when she realizes how shallow his relationship with her husband really is. This play had quite an impact, in India where the fundamental nuclear relationship in a marriage the social roles each partner must play and the lies that are generated in the relationship had not previously been the subject of open discussion.

MITRA’s production of another Ibsen play, An Enemy of the People (Dasachakra) was also a great success when first performed 1952. The story of a doctor, who faces ostracism because of his determination to tell the truth about the polluted waters in his town which makes its living from a health spa, was also adapted into the India idiom. Ibsen's Dr. Stockman became Dr. Guha and MITRA himself played that role with mastery and deep understanding of the doctor moral dilemma when confronted with the town's unconscionable greed. He employed the largest number of people yet used on the Indian stage in the final confrontation scene. Other Western plays successfully translated into Bengali by MITRA and performed by Bohurupee including Chekhov's Anniversary (Sedin Bangalakshmi Bankey) and Oedip Rex (Raja Oidipous) by Sophocles. MITRA gave a memorable performance as Oedipus. Tripti as Iocaste, the mother, was equally outstanding.

Although MITRA directed seven highly successful plays with Bohurupee during the early years of 1950 to 1953, it was the 1954 production of Tagore's Raktakarabi (Red Oleanders) which brought Bohurupee and Bengali theater into national prominence and won MITRA critical acclaim. The production won the first prize in the National Drama Festival. Later performances were attended by Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru, future prime minister Indira Gandhi and other high government officials.

During those years troupes without theaters of their own were forced to collect tax on tickets to their performances whereas commercial companies were not taxed. Finally, the West Bengal government 1958 lifted the amusement tax on group theater tickets, thus helping the non-commercial groups appeal to a wider audience.

In 1961, the year of Tagore's centenary, there were numerous performances of his plays throughout India. Most, according to the critics, were unsuccessful except those put on by Bohurupee. In Calcutta and Delhi the troupe performed Raktakarabi and, for the first time, Visarjan (Sacrifice), getting rave reviews and burying once and for all the idea that Tagore could not be properly performed. Bohurupee's success in producing Tagore's plays was due largely to MITRA's expert clipping and skillful integration of relevant parts into the whole, the method of presentation, and sensitive handling of the language as conversation so that it acquired a contemporary meaning.

Raktakarabi written as a prose poem, with symbolic philosophical dialogue, is the story of a king (MITRA), secluded with his gold and the bones of his victims in a country where cruel overseers supervise nameless workers who do nothing but dig gold for their masters. Into this bleak world comes Nandini (Tripti), a vibrant young woman who always wears red oleanders, and Ranjan, her lover. Nandini confronts the king (although she cannot see him), with her visions of beauty, telling him that Ranjan will soon come to free the people from their miserable conditions. The king eventually comes to realize that he too is a prisoner of the overseers. In the meantime his deputies, who fear the arrival of Ranjan, have the king unknowingly kill him. Discovering what he has done, the king rushes out of his seclusion and joins Nandini in the revolt which has started. Together they lead the workers to a new life of spiritual freedom.

MITRA interprets the "play's greatness" as "an outspoken critique of industrial civilization." It portrays "the inhuman organization of the human race and the throttling of individuality in a society based on dead, non-renewable resources, symbolized by gold. It says to come out and try a new kind of civilization using renewable resources, which does not kill individuality."

The plot of Visarjan is similar in that it too revolves around the problem of morality and has current application. The principal character represents a new messiah in the world and the theme is the clash within him between morality and the new ideology. King Govinda, moved by the plea of a beggar girl whose goat has been sacrificed in the rituals to appease the Goddess Kali (the destroyer and the renewer in the Hindu triumvirate), forbids further sacrifice at the temple. As a result he provokes the wrath of the high priest Raghupati. In his anger the priest tries to get the queen and his disciple and dearly loved foster son, Jaisingha, who epitomizes the moral conflict, to plot the king's death and thereby offer royal blood to Kali. He is finally able to convince the king's brother to do the deed, but the plot is discovered and Raghupati is banished. Before he leaves, however, Jaisingha commits suicide. Raghupati, horrified by the consequences of his dogmatism, breaks the idol of the goddess as he comes to realize that she is no more than stone.

As Jaisingha, MITRA brought a compelling performance to a character who is torn between conflicting meanings of life and who kills himself, not out of an affirmation of will, but as a sacrifice to end the conflict. Tripti, as the queen, also received enthusiastic reviews.

Another of Tagore's plays successfully performed in the 1960s was Raja (The King of the Dark Chamber), the second of his two plays on darkness. In performances of this play MITRA was able to convey to the audience the spiritual pilgrimage undertaken by a woman to understand herself and fit herself into the scheme of life. Although the king's presence pervades the land he is never seen and his authority is never enforced; his subjects are free and equal. The beautiful and arrogant queen wishes to see the king, who has only come to her in the dark, but when she does, she is shocked by his ugliness. She then goes through a period of trial, humiliation and suffering until she realizes that her own earthly endowments are transient and returns to the king, purged of her arrogance and pride, recognizing the force within his calm, and the true nature of his deeper beauty. Every person, this play of Tagore's says, must make this pilgrimage, dispense with the superficial and find his place.

Bohurupee has also presented works by contemporary Indian playwrights: Pagla Ghora (The Mad Horse), performed first in 1969, and Baki Itihas (The Other Side of History) by Bengali Badal Sarkar who in 1969 won the Sangeet Natak Akademi (Music Drama Academy) Award for playwriting; and Chop, Adalat Chalchhey (Silence, the Court is in Session) by the Marathi playwright Vijoy Tendulkar, in 1971

MITRA has written, as well as produced and acted in, Bengali plays and these, too, have been highly successful. In Kanchanranga (The Force of Gold) (1961), which makes fun of man's greed for money, Panchu is the poor relation of a struggling middle class family. He wins a large sum of money. Ill-treated and abused before, he becomes the darling of the household. All members of the family—the nagging wife, the wayward son and the love-struck daughter—scheme to get the money. Upon finding out that Panchu has not won after all, they turn on him in their disappointment. In the end, however, Panchu really does win the money, and wiser but sadder he leaves the family as they look helplessly on. MITRA also wrote Bibhav (described by him as "a sketch without stage props") in 1951, a one-act sarcastic satire, and Ghurnee (The Whirlwind) written between 1951 and 1952.

He is in the process of writing a play which seeks to capture the flavor of folk life in Bengal and the age old issues of man's existence. The play, to be called Chandbaniker Pala (Tale of Merchant Chand), is based upon the legend of merchant Chand's experiments with truth, symbolized by his attempts to establish the God Shiva, symbol of truth and well-being, in a society under the control of the snake goddess who represents superstition and fear. Concerned about presenting moral dilemmas in an Indian setting, as has been his preoccupation throughout his theater career, MITRA has his principal character in this play create a god more or less the epitome of all the goodness of Indian moral values and one day find the god coming to terms with the darkness that surrounds mankind.

"The scrupulous artist of the stage," he says, "must seek to touch the depths of his national sensibility which, comprising its myths, legends and history, constitute its subconscious."

Besides writing plays, MITRA has written essays on the theater which have been collected into book form in Abhinay Natak Mancha (Acting, Drama and the Stage) published in the 1950s and Prasanga: Natya (Subject: Theater) which followed in 1970. These essays have a depth and range of interest that make them essential reading for anyone seriously involved in theatrical production.

MITRA compares a theater group with a family—if one member does not behave or perform well, then the whole group is discredited. Thus during rehearsals MITRA is a strict taskmaster, seeing that no one strays from the work at hand. No smoking, tea drinking or irrelevant talk is tolerated.

Throughout his directing career simplicity has characterized MITRA’s approach to staging. A few details have been used to convey illusions of distance, vast empty spaces and grandeur. In Raktakarabi, for example, the setting was symbolic—the king's chamber was offstage with only a red light visible to indicate his presence. In Raja the stage was broken horizontally by a ramp running along the length of the stage. In Pagla Ghora MITRA divided the stage into areas, some to be used for scenes of the present and others for the flashbacks so essential to the plot.

MITRA’s interpretive handling of dialogue is unique. He is demanding about enunciation, subtleties of rhythm and tonal quality, and he also has a great flair for dramatizing pauses. The actors under his direction move with a fluidity and perfection of body gesture. Lighting, too, is of concern to him and he has often used light, shade and darkness to achieve startling results. In Raktakarabi, the light, which focuses upon Nandini as she sits on the steps leading to the king's chambers, slowly dims and spreads creating interesting patterns before spotlighting the king's door. In Raja Oidipous one sees the shadow of the king against the red interior of the palace which establishes a grotesque yet pathetic atmosphere even before the story unfolds.

SOMBHU MlTRA has often been honored by his countrymen. In 1959 he was selected as the best theater director of the year by the Sangeet Natak Akademi in New Delhi and in 1966 was elected a Fellow of that organization. The Indian government's national honor for civilian service, the Padma Bhushan, was presented to MITRA in 1970. When Bohurupee celebrated its 25th anniversary (1973), the praises poured in, including a congratulatory note from Prime Minister Indira Gandhi.

Chop, Adalat Chalchhey is the last play that MITRA has directed. Since he formed the Bangla Natmancha Pratistha Samity (the Bengal National Theater Organization) in 1968 MITRA has given much of his time to this body. His goal is to build a modern well-equipped theater complex—with stage, library, seminar rooms, miniature auditorium and projection rooms—which will provide a place for experimental theater to flourish without fear of financial loss and without dependence solely upon the availability of commercial theaters. He believes that Bohurupee should be merged with other major Bengali troupes into this one Bengali theater group. The development of the complex he envisions was "temporarily stalled by the emergence of the leftist United Front Government in Bengal and was not helped by the Congress Government which came to power in 1972." At present, therefore, MITRA’s only regular source of income comes from his job as head of the Department of Drama at the Rabindra Bharati University; this school, founded in memory of Rabindranath Tagore, provides an education in Bengali which emphasizes Indian culture and the arts. Financial reward has, over the years, meant little to MITRA and his wife. If it did they would have stayed in films where both had growing national reputations.

MITRA is a complex, powerful personality, with great intellectual curiosity, sincerity and strong moral standards in the broadest sense of the term. He is, at the same time, compassionate, humble and even vulnerable; he never speaks ill of his detractors but is hurt by their lack of appreciation of what he is trying to accomplish. His total dedication to his work is legendary, and is undertaken with missionary zeal.

Other leading figures in the Indian theater recognize his stature and his impact in creating a modern Indian theater and "molding the taste of a whole generation." P. L. Deshpande, a Marathi, writes: "He could without any fear of exaggeration be described as the most respected man in Indian theater today." Rudraprasad Sen Gupta, who belongs to the most important Bengali theater group next to Bohurupee, calls MITRA "the most vital actor, greatest director and foremost personality of the contemporary Indian stage," and Herbert Marshall, editor of Indian Theater and Cinema, rates him as "a top director anywhere. "

MITRA himself sees his role as actor, playwright and director one of helping individuals define truth in terms of today's problems, knowledge and aspirations. Drama, he believes, is a way of confronting one's society and discovering for oneself the meanings of good and evil. Through the theater, he says, "society, man and human dynamics are examined from a fresh angle." This new vision in turn "discovers for itself new artistic forms." This explains why, he adds, "genuine art in the beginning appears rebellious, a destroyer of national values. . . .Since life itself is complex, with a multitude of dimensions, levels and nuances, art, if it is to become meaningful, has similarly to be multidimensional, multi-level, enriching national values and at the same time echoing universal concerns." MITRA has successfully created such an art through the medium of Bohurupee.

September 1976
Manila

REFERENCES:

Anand, Mulk Raj. The Indian Theatre. London: Dennis Dobson Ltd. 1950.

Awasthy, Suresh. "Indian Theatre Today," Hindustan Times Weekly. New Delhi. November 12, 1961.

Benegal, Som. A Panorama of Theatre in India. New Delhi. Indian Council for Cultural Relations. 1968.

Comments on Sombhu Mitra by Staff of Jugantar, Calcutta (1976). Made to Belen H. Abreu. Issued by the Ramon Magsaysay Award Foundation on the occasion of the Group Discussion led by Sombhu Mitra Ramon Magsaysay Award Foundation. 1976. (Mimeographed.)

Delhi Times. March 4,1956.

Evening News of India. Bombay. September 14, 1964.

Hindu. Madras, India September 21,1964.

Hindustan Standard. Calcutta. February 25,1956.

Hindustan Times. New Delhi. February 22, 1956; March 6, 1969; December 22, 1971.

Indian Express. Bombay. January 7, 1961; September 23,1964; May 14, 1971.

Indian P.E.N. Bangalore, India. February 1951.

Marshall, Herbert. "India, Oh, India," Hindustan Times. New Delhi. February (?), 1962.

Mazumdar, Debu. "Sombhu Mitra and the Bohurupee," Arts and Events. Delhi. November 5, 1961.

Mitra, Sombhu. "Dramatic Images in Shaping National Values." Presentation made to group Discussion. Ramon Magsaysay Award Foundation, Manila. September 2, 1976. (Typewritten transcript.)

______. Workshop with the Philippine Educational Theater Association (PETA). Ramon Magsaysay Award Foundation. September 4, 1976. (Typewritten transcript.)

Natya, Theatre Arts Journal. New Delhi. Asian Institute of Dramatic Arts. Vol. 1, no. 1, 1956; Vol. 3, no. 3, 1959; Tagore Issue, 1961; Vol. 6, nos. 1 and 2, 1962.

Raha Kironmoy. "Calcutta Scene," Natya, Theatre Arts Journal. New Delhi. Asian Institute of Dramatic Arts. Vol. 5, no. 3, 1961, p. 51-56; Vol. 7, no. 2, 1963, p. 28, 31-32

______. "Good Play and a Great Director," Hindustan Times. New Delhi March 6, 1969.

Statesman. Calcutta. July 13, December 22, 1954; February 23, 1956; June 14, 1971.

Times of India. Bombay. December 22, 1959; October 30,1966.

Interview with Sombhu Mitra and letters from and interviews with his colleagues.