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Culture is one of the crucial factors behind the formation and articulation of identities. Overcoming the stereotype of ‘base-superstructure’ binary the neo-Marxists rightly pointed out the role of culture both as a reflection of the economic base as well as the potential arena of reproducing the ruling economic base through a daily basis meticulous mechanism known as hegemony. In order to challenge the ruling hegemony a counter cultural process is required, which encompasses all the dissenting and marginal voices prevailing in the society. This paper is going to deal with such a counter cultural attempt, which is commonly known as the progressive cultural movement to challenge the ruling hegemony in the context of Bengali literature and culture. The progressive cultural movement in Bengal started as a world-wide response to the war-ridden international political order at that time, when the fascist aggression was in its peak and the scope of democracy was threatened globally. The leading intellectuals like Henry Barbusse and Romain Rolland in Europe started to organize all the intellectuals under a broader democratic and progressive organizational umbrella against destruction of war. Thus, the League against War and Fascism was established and most notably Rabindranath Tagore became its President. Inspired from this ideological aura some of the Indian intellectuals in Britain founded an organization named All India Progressive Writers Association (AIPWA), which gradually expanded its root all over India including Bengal. In Bengal, where the cultural politics was already established in the wake of Swadeshi movement, the new ideological-cultural programme was well accepted among its intelligentsia. In this we context we have to keep in mind the role of the Communist Party in mobilizing the intellectuals, bringing them under a broader ideological platform, both in India as well as in other countries. The movement was committed towards the motto of bringing back people into the literature and culture. The voice of the movement became louder with the formation of Indian People’s Theatre Association (IPTA), who declared “People’s theatre stars the People”. Most notably, this movement introduced the Bengali intelligentsia with the ideological currents of Marxism and on the other hand, Marxism as a narrative became synonymous with the ideals of progressivism. Application of Marxist principles such as dialectics, class struggle and its revolutionary potential became the critical yardstick through which the literature and performance used to be measured as the ‘ideal’ standard. Thus the authenticity in ‘revolutionary’ literature provoked myriad questions within the Bengali intelligentsia, which led to serious and critical debates. Debates were triggered off regarding the role of the communist party in the cultural front. Prominent Bengali intellectuals like Manik Bandopadhayay, Tarasankar Bandyopadhyay, Bishnu Dey, Samar Sen, Hemanga Biswas, Salil Chowdhury took part in this great debates. This paper will critically focus into the debates among the Bengali intelligentsia and will uphold the nature of the progressive cultural movement and thus concentrates into the limitation of the movement especially its middle-class centrism and critically answer the question whether this performance of resistance was merely an ‘elite performance’ or not.