Opinion Elites don’t get it

In our country,in keeping with our obsessions with name and form (“naama-roopa” in Sanskrit),groups have focused not only on erecting buildings,complexes and statues,but also on naming them in order to obtain desired political mileage. This explains the actions in Maharashtra of re-naming British buildings. The British christened as Victoria Terminus the largest station of the Great Indian Peninsular Railway; the leading museum of western India was named for the Prince of Wales. These were well-considered acts. Re-naming them for Shivaji is also a deliberate political act. The buildings do not become any less gothic or Indo-Saracenic; they cannot be considered examples of Maratha architecture. But they do project the desired triumphalism of the new rulers. When the Somnath temple was re-built in the forties,the person behind it,K.M. Munshi,emphasised the fact that the temple was rising again like a phoenix. What was this,if not a political statement about Hindu resurgence? The Mantap on the famous Vivekananda Rock south of Kanyakumari can and should be seen as a statement of political assertion on the part of a modern version of Hinduism. Soon after this structure was constructed,the DMK sponsored a massive statue of the Tamil poet Tiruvalluvar on another rock close by. This act was an assertion of a Tamil and Dravidian identity and a riposte to the Vivekananda memorial. The choice made in the naming of buildings is also not accidental and is meant to give a message to citizens. When the Delhi airport is named for Indira Gandhi,a massive university is named for Jawaharlal Nehru,a postmodern road bridge is named for Rajiv Gandhi or a wildlife park is named for Sanjay Gandhi,the message being given is that the Nehru-Gandhi family represents the politics of modernity and ecological concern. In many parts of India,one comes across swanky,well-painted,flood-lit mosques of recent vintage. These are visible political statements of Islamic resurgence and the power of money from the Gulf and Saudi Arabia.

The underlying assumption is that group pride and loyalty can be manipulated using buildings and their names as instruments. The official brochures and colourful advertisements of the Government of India have also been working hard to generate pride in India’s past,leveraging photographs of monuments. The buildings depicted carefully avoid any from the British era,which is assumed to be a shameful period that is best forgotten. But there are plenty of photographs of the Taj Mahal,the Sanchi Stupa,the Hampi chariot,the Lingaraja temple,the Brihadeeshwara temple,etc. The schoolchildren of India — and for that matter all citizens — are expected to be filled with an overwhelming sense of pride as they get acquainted with the great architectural achievements of their ancestors. The not-so-subtle message is that we were a great country before the British came.

Even as they indulge their pride (misplaced or otherwise) contemplating the architecture and the names of the past and present,India’s elites seem to forget the ironical fact that the Dalits do not have much of a place in these sanitised propaganda efforts. Upper-caste Hindus may take pride in the Madurai temple; Muslims may take pride in the Gol Gumbaz; Jains may take pride in the Gomateshwara statue; Sikhs may take pride in the Amritsar Golden Temple; Buddhists may take pride in the Sanchi Stupa; Christians may take pride in the San Thome Cathedral. What are Dalits to take pride in? The grand temples of India (including the ruined ones) are only reminders of buildings where the ancestors of today’s Dalits were denied entry.

It is this lacuna in Dalit identity formation that Mayawati has brilliantly recognised. She is not at all stupid when she builds a park and erects statues with the conscious motive of overawing visitors with a sense of gigantism. She is imitating Rajaraja,Shah Jahan and Hardinge. And she understands that,in a century or two,a Dalit parent can proudly take his or her children to the monument and show it to the young ones with a measure of pride whispering in their ears,“We had a great leader — look around you and take pride in what she built.” We fail to understand the important political purpose of Mayawati’s projects,but we overlook the DMK’s aesthetically challenged statues,we dare not criticise the repeated use of Shivaji’s name and we acquiesce in the monopolisation of the public space by the Nehru-Gandhi family.

Mayawati is a superb politician and will go down in history as one who did what great statesmen from Augustus Caesar down have done — she is using architecture to achieve political ends. Dalits get this. The chattering elites need to abandon their double standards and understand this.

The writer is a Mumbai-based entrepreneur
jerry.rao@expressindia.com