ABSTRACT
The strains within the nationalist camp over the war had an impact on the PWA movement. It had been drawn to the most left-wing elements within the nationalist faction and many had joined the CPI during the 1930s and early 1940s. A central concern of progressive writers had always been the unity of the nationalist movement, and they were sensitive to the tensions over questions of the nature of the war and the Quit India resolution. The tensions created by the war paradoxically created space for a greater flourishing of progressive cultural activity. As Ralph Russell has pointed out, the arrest of the Congress leadership and the almost exclusive preoccupation of the League with ‘Muslim’ interests left the field open for the left. The Indian People’s Theatre Association, launched in May 1943 in Bombay, with N. M. Joshi as its president and Anil de Silva as general secretary, was one of the biggest strides towards a popular audience.
