Postcards from India’s past
From Gandhi and Bhagat Singh to workers building a new India, photographs and archives reveal how images shaped the visual story of Independence.
A collection of postcards, photographs, and other artefacts from India's independence struggle draws attention to the enduring legacy of the movement. Museo Camera, in Gurugram, hosts an archive of press photographer Kulwant Roy, showcasing candid shots of national leaders and common citizens between the 1930s and 1960s. Meanwhile, in Mumbai, freedom fighter Anand T Hingorani's archive is up for auction, featuring personal correspondence, Gandhi's watch, and photographs by Kanu Gandhi and Dady Rustom Dossabhoy Wadia.
In New Delhi, the Tuli Research Centre for India Studies (TRIS) showcases an extensive exhibit, including silver gelatin prints by Henri Cartier-Bresson, film posters, paintings, and newspaper clippings from pre-independence India to the years following. Each collection contributes to the narrative of India's birth as a nation, capturing the optimism and progress of the time, even as some events, such as the Bengal Famine of 1943 and the Partition Riots of 1947, remain unseen in the images.
These visual representations of the freedom fighters and leaders, often accompanied by Hindu mythological iconography, spread the message of independence far and wide, aided by advancements in printing and photography.
Written by urgent.news from Hindustan Times's reporting — not their text. Machine-written — may contain errors; check the original before relying on it.
