'1954: Key Events

• Zhou Enlai visits India, and Nehru goes to Beijing where he signs the ‘Five Principles of Peaceful Co-existence’ with Mao Zedong.

• The National Gallery of Modern Art opens in New Delhi.

• The Lalit Kala (Fine Arts) Akademi and Sahitya (Literature) Akademi open.

• The first national film awards go to Shyamchi Aai and Jagat Murari’s short, Mahabalipuram. Awara is a major hit in the USSR.

• Abbas’s Munna is the second ‘songless’ film; it was shown at the Edinburgh Film Festival in 1955.

• Indian film delegations visit the Middle East and the USSR.

• Talks between the Film Federation of India and the government fail over All-India Radio’s policy of broadcasting film songs without crediting sources, driving producers into using Radio Ceylon.

• The compulsory exhibition of ‘approved films’ (i. e. government propaganda films) in Madras is declared unlawful by the Supreme Court.

• The Premier Studio, Mysore’s second studio premises, is started by M. N. Basavarajaiah.