Starring Jaggaiah, Savitri, Gummadi Venkateswara Rao, Perumallu, Ramanamurthy J.V., Nagabhushanam, Chadalavada Kutumbarao, Ramana Reddy, Girija, Suryakala.
When Tilak founded Anupama Films to make sensible cinema, his colleagues from Praja Natya Mandali might have expected him to come out with a purposeful theme for his debut production, but he chose a sentimental saga (Muddubidda) and received dividends from the box office. For his second production, the editor turned producer-director decided to go for a ‘political’ subject. Moreover, between 1950 and ’56 of the 159 Telugu movies released, there was only one film worth mentioning that had political connotations, which was K.V. Reddi’s Peddamanushulu. So the time was ripe to make one more.
Tilak engaged veteran Tapi Dharmarao and Arudra to pen the story that revolved around remote control politics. He made a socio-political movie, a term germane only to Indian cinema and ingeniously intertwined it with a love story.
The Story:
Bhushaiah, a Gandhian, works for the welfare of the farmers. His daughter Nirmala follows his ideals. The powerful landlord Damodaram dissuades sitting MLA Papaiah from contesting again as he fears his defeat. Instead he supports Dasu, an upright young man whose candidature is also acceptable to Bhushaiah and Nirmala. By fielding Dasu, Damodaram thinks that he can continue to wield the power from behind as even Dasu, a government employee was involved in corruption once and the letter to prove it is with Damodaram. Dasu marries Nirmala. He goes against Damodaram and speaks up for the land ceiling bill. An irked Damodaram sends his niece Leela to threaten him. She spills the beans about Dasu’s corrupt past to Nirmala which creates a void between the spouses. Ramesh who is in love with Dasu’s sister Kamala, comes to his rescue by getting hold of the letter and destroys it. Dasu pursues his goal without any fear and earns the praise of his kith and the people.
Cast & Crew:
Tilak showed how the rich and powerful without themselves contesting the elections, choose a person who is close to the people, help him win election with their influence and money power and make him work in their favour. He made a good attempt and succeeded with competent support from cinematographer Laxman Gore, other technicians and actors.
Jaggaiah and Savitri enacted the characters – Dasu and Nirmala. Gummadi and Perumallu came up with excellent portrayals as Damodaram and Bhushaiah respectively. Nagabhushanam (Papaiah) and Suryakala (Leela) made their presence felt. Though he was debuting, Ramanamurthy as Ramesh enacted the role like a seasoned actor.
Girija (Kamala) was paired with him. Khurshid was spotted by Tilak in Mehandi area in Hyderabad and signed her for a qawwali dance number – Sarasulu chathurulu saahasavanthulu… (rendered by P. Susheela). This was the only film that Khurshid starred.
Pendyala Nageswara Rao's excellent musical score also played a major part in the movie’s success. Arudra penned most of the lyrics while three campaign songs (Kotalo Nee seetekkadunnadi…, Guttuga maa maata vinavayyaa.. and Mathrudesamunaku pareekshadinamidi…) were written by Koganti Gopalakrishnaiah, Tilak’s colleague at Praja Natya Mandali. Pendyala introduced the later day’s diva of South Indian film music, Sishtla Janaki with the all-time hit song – Nee Aasa Adiyaasa… which she sang along with Ghantasala. Her other rendition with Ghantasala, Idenandi Idenandi Bhagyanagaramu… tracing the history and cultural heritage of Hyderabad was a hit too. The duet – Jami Chettu meeda nunna jaathi ramachiluka… (A.M. Raja – Jikki) was filmed on Ramanamurthy and Girija at Gandipeta gardens. Namo namo Bapu maaku nyaya margame choopu (Madhavapeddi Satyam – P. Susheela) was another popular song from the album.
Trivia:
The film was shot mostly in outdoor locations and the set work was done at Prakash and Venus studios in Madras. The election campaign scenes were shot at Mannegudem village in Mahaboobabad constituency from where Nookala Ramachandra Reddy contested for the Assembly at that time.
His election campaign procession was shot for the film by using jeep head lights. One of the campaign songs, Guttuga maa maata vinavayaa… Loguttu telusuko Babayya… was shot in a location in Khammam where now a flyover has come up.
In the movie, Jaggaiah’s election symbol was ‘cow and calf’ and years later in 1971 Congress Party under the leadership of Indira Gandhi fought the elections under cow and calf symbol.
In 1957 Jaggaiah played the role of an M.L.A. and in 1967 he was elected to the Lok Sabha from Ongole on a Congress party ticket.
In 1954 Andhra Nataka Kalaparishad conducted a drama competition at Hyderabad. Ramanamurthy staged, ‘Kalarathri’ and won the best actor and best performance awards. D.V. Narasaraju’s play ‘Illu Addekivvabadunu’ won the best production award and it was Narasaraju who told about this new actor Ramanamurthy to industry bigwigs. L.V. Prasad was planning Kodukulu-Kodallu with newcomers and screen tested Ramanamurthy, his elder brother J.V. Somayajulu (who later became known nationwide with the cult classic, Sankarabharanam.) and Sarada. But the film was shelved. Tilak, Prasad’s nephew saw the screen test and took Ramanamurthy for the hero’s friend’s role in M.L.A.
Though S. Janaki first sang for a Tamil film, Vidhiyin Vilayaattu in April 1957 it was not released. Thus M.L.A became her first release.
The same year she made her Tamil debut too with a duet –Kannukku neere… along with P.B. Srinivos in Magadhal Naattu Mary (released on December 20, 1957) under the baton of R. Parthasarathi.
When a Russian cultural delegation visited Madras, Tilak arranged a special screening of M.L.A and at their request, sent a print to the former USSR. Tilak also sent a print to South Yemen with English subtitles written by Sri Sri. Unfortunately, no print of the film is preserved today.
Released on September 19, 1957, M.L.A did fairly well at the box office.
