Gaban (1966)

Set in Allahabad, 1928, in the anti-British terrorist actions that peaked between the Simon Commission and the Gandhi-Irwin Pact (1929), Premchand’s story tells of Ramnath (Dutt), son of a small-time clerk in the Allahabad court, who borrows large amounts of money in order to satisfy his wife’s desire for jewellery. This forces him to embezzle money at the court, and gets the police after him. On the run, and unaware that his wife has repaid the embezzled money, he is blackmailed by a repressive police force into presenting a false eyewitness account that would convict non- violent nationalists for terrorist acts. One of Dutt’s better-known screen performances holds together a film that was patched together by Mukherjee following the death of the original director, Chopra.