PRAMOD PATI(1932-1975) was a maverick in the field of cinema. Working in the early sixties Promod Pati built up his poetic oeuvre through experimental and animation cinema. After graduating from Utkal University in 1950, Pati took a diploma in Cinematography from S.J.Polytechnic, Bangalore, in 1952, and then worked with the Odisha Govt. as film officer from 1952 to 1956. During this period he made fourteen films in three years as Cinematographer, Scriptwriter , and Editor. He was awarded a Government of India fellowship to study puppet animation at FAMU, in Prague, Czechoslovakia, under Jifi Brdecka, Edward Hoffman and Jiri Trnka. Returning to India he joined Films Division, Mumbai, as head of its animation unit in 1959 and there he began making the first Indian animation film. Pati is best known for his experimental work in animation and is regarded as the Father of Indian films.

Films Division which was set up in 1949 at Mumbai, by the Information and Broadcasting Ministry, Govt. of India, was full of exuberance in the early sixties. There was a mellifluous combination of rebellious, independent filmmakers like S. Sukhdev, K.S. Chari, Glen Baptista, Fali Billimoria and the genius Pati. They all congregated at Films Divisons to fulfil their creative urges. Pati was the maker of a one minute classic film “Man and his World”, which won the Silver medal at the “Montreal Expo-67”. He was also the first Odia filmmaker to receive a Film Fare award at Mumbai in 1968 for his short film,”Perspective.

Pati was not given to gimmickry. He had a genuine urge to experiment. We can see this clearly in the short film Perspectives which lasted under a minute and had no commentary. It is virtually a one shot film in which the camera follows a jet plane taking off and pans down to show a little girl and wrinkled old woman sitting close together in front of a hut, saying the letters of the Hindi alphabet aloud together. The film was produced to mark International Adult Literacy Year and won Pati a well-deserved international award. Pati’s early death was a tragic loss to experimental cinema.

Pati’s work evoked extreme reactions. Explorer which lasts just seven minutes but whose visual and aural impact is felt a long time after, is a probe into the young urban Indian mind. Pati films are full of startling contrasts and juxtapositions. Tantric  symbols and images of meditating sadhus are juxtaposed with teenagers doing the twist and computers being cut with the chanting of prayers. But the camera always returns to the young people in labs, libraries, fields-all of them searching, seeking, exploring. The film had no narration. When it was shown in theatres the audience reaction was extreme. Used as they were to the didactic “narrated” documentary, this film came as a shock so much so that at a seminar in the Films Division after the film was shown, the noted film critic.