Post Datum

madhubanmitra — Fri, 21 Oct 2011 20:45:22 +0000

Temp Mort

madhubanmitra — Fri, 21 Oct 2011 19:55:55 +0000

An Autopsy of the Great Indian Camera

madhubanmitra — Fri, 21 Oct 2011 19:48:35 +0000

Persistent Circuits

madhubanmitra — Fri, 21 Oct 2011 19:41:30 +0000

The Archaeology of Absence: A Typology

madhubanmitra — Wed, 19 Oct 2011 19:59:04 +0000

The Archaeology of Absence

manasbhattacharya — Thu, 13 Oct 2011 18:29:15 +0000

There are ghosts here. Of habit. Of whimsy. The bristle of the private erupting in the grey, indeterminate public.

Prologue

manasbhattacharya — Thu, 13 Oct 2011 18:12:51 +0000

National Instruments Ltd. is the company that produced the National 35, the first and only major still camera manufactured in India. Launched in 1979, the National 35 was meant to be the iconic “Indian” camera that, as history would have it, it never quite became.

The origins of the company can be traced back to 1830 when George Everest, the Surveyor General of India, felt the need for a skilled mechanic to service and maintain surveying equipment without sending them to England. Soon after, a workshop was established in Calcutta for the repair of instruments, and eventually it was christened the Mathematical Instruments Office, with Syed Meer Mohasin as the first Indian Mathematical Instrument Maker. The factory moved to its current premises in 1957 and was rechristened National Instruments Ltd. with the aim of manufacturing and servicing high-precision instruments for use by the land survey, meteorological and defence departments of the Govt. of India. National Instruments soon became known for manufacturing various optical, mechanical and electronic instruments, including binoculars, thermometers, compasses, microscopes, rain gauges and other meteorological instruments, and various kinds of surveying instruments.

When the National 35 camera arrived, it swiftly became the flagship product of the company since it was their first offering for the general consumer. In the pre-liberalisation India of the early 80s, the camera acquired great popularity and a certain reputation. It was hoped that the advent of this indigenous camera would have a huge impact on the photography industry in this country.

However, like many public sector enterprises dating back to the Nehruvian era, National Instruments Ltd. went into decline towards the end of the 80s and was declared as a sick industry by the Board for Industrial and Financial Reconstruction (BIFR) in 1992. Consequently, the company steadily dissolved its workforce, most of its employees went out on voluntary retirement schemes, and production finally came to a complete halt. Jadavpur University took over National Instruments Ltd. alongwith the remaining 64 employees in January 2009 with plans to establish a new campus on its premises.

As we entered the precincts for the first time, in the lobby of the administrative building a gigantic replica of the National 35 camera stared back at us. In another time, a light concealed inside would illuminate its darkening lens…