Mapping the Temporal shifts in meanings of the Urban form, in post colonial Kolkata

MAPPING THE TEMPORAL SHIFTS IN MEANING OF THE URBAN FORM, IN POST COLONIAL K O L K ATA

ARUNIMA SEN

Mapping the temporal shifts in meaning of the Urban Form, in post-colonial Kolkata

Arunima Sen Guided by Sonal Mithal Modi

Master of Architecture Faculty of Architecture

May, 2017

Arunima Sen

4

Dedicated to

The City of Joy - Kolkata

Arunima Sen

6

U N D E RTA K I N G I, Arunima Sen, the author of the dissertation titled Mapping the temporal shifts in meaning of the Urban Form, in post-colonial Kolkata, hereby declare that this is an independent work of mine, carried out towards partial fulfilment of the requirements for the award of Masters of Architecture degree at the Faculty of Architecture, CEPT University, Ahmedabad. This work has not been submitted to any other institution for the award of any degree/diploma.

Arunima Sen PA100815 Date: 19.05.2017 Place: CEPT University, Ahmedabad

Disclaimer This document describes work undertaken as part of the M.Arch/ MLA/ MLD degree at the Faculty of Architecture, CEPT University. All views and opinions expressed therein remain the sole responsibility of the author, and do not necessarily represent those of CEPT University, the Dissertation Guide(s), or the Dissertation Committee.  

Arunima Sen

8

CERTIFICATE

This is to certify that the dissertation titled Mapping the temporal shifts in meaning of the Urban Form, in post-colonial Kolkata has been submitted by Arunima Sen towards partial fulfilment of the requirements for the award of Masters of Architecture degree, in accordance with the undertaking signed by the student on the previous page.

Sonal Mithal Guide: Date:

Prof. Urvi Desai Dissertation Coordinator, 2017 Date:

Arunima Sen

10

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

This work of thesis has been an experience in itself, helping me not only to become a better researcher, but also know my city better.

The process would have been impossible without the contribution of my guide, Sonal Mithal, who took me under her guidance at the last moment and helped me towards a meaningful completion of this project. I have been fortunate to have Prof. Vishwanath Kashikar, Prof. Sachin Soni and Mr. Umesh Surpali as my reviewers during this journey, who have been constantly critical, helping me develop my work.

My gratitude goes out also the the following people: - Avishek, my classmate and dear friend, who inspires me and criticises me at every point, and has been there at all times of my struggle. This thesis would not be possible without the numerous discussions with him and his constant push to do better.

- Mr. Alok Mukherjee who shared with me his knowledge about Colonial Calcutta.

- Sayak Nag and Prithul Saha, old friends for last minute valuable information.

- To all those Bengali friends and acquaintances who took time to fill out a little survey I needed for my work in this thesis.

- Classmates here at CEPT, Rohit Sanatani and Pranav Meghani for every bit of advice now and then.

Last but not the least my gratitude goes to my parents, who, even though were not present with me, but were extremely supportive of my work all throughout.

11

Arunima Sen

Arunima Sen

12

Contents Acknowledgements List of Figures Introduction The Politically Aware City........................... 3 Plan of this Research ...................................7 Discourses of Power and Political Space Political ideology and the Urban Space.....................11 Foucault: Power being omnipresent ...........................15 From Calcutta to Kolkata: Politics and Power in the City....................21 Colonial Calcutta: The Built form and Power Relations.......................31 The White Town- A show of Imperial Power...................................35 Wellesley’s Minute...........................................................................39 The Government house.....................................................................41 The Physical Layout.........................................................................45 The Post-independent City Salt Lake City: The Socialistic Pattern.............................................51 New Town: the Neoliberal town.......................................................59 Biswa Bangla: The World Class Hub of culture...............................65 Representation of Power: Decoding the Tools The Grid .................................................................79 Homogeneity...........................................................83 Stories of Subversion..........................................................................85 References.............................................................................................90

13

Arunima Sen

Arunima Sen

14

LIST OF FIGURES 1 . The Indian Cof fe e ho u se at College S treet, Kolkata , h a s been a s eat of po litic al disc ussion s a n d d ia logu e. O n e c a n still f in d people d ebating over po litic al ma n ifestation s, orientation s a n d opin ion s 2 . Calc ut ta during the British ru le 3 . So c ialistic pat te rn of S oc iety in S a lt La ke 4 . N eolibe ral N ew Tow n 5 . Ko lkat a be ing f re shly pa inted to rev ive its sh een 6 . Po litic al ide olo gies get ref lected by th e form s of govern m ent 7 . Panopt ico n: a m ec han ism of power 8 . Fo ucault ’s c once pt io n of power relation s 9 . St ruct ure of the Briti sh M on a rc hy over In d ia 1 0. Map of Calc ut ta in 1 910 issu ed by th e Ca lc u tta Im provem ent Tr ust 1 1. Structure of the Po st- in d epen d ent govern m ent 1 2. The new Fo rt William , w ith th e M a id a n a rou n d it 1 3. Chow ringhee, place of British R esid en c es 1 4. Chitpur Ro ad in t he N orth of th e W h ite Tow n , wa s m a in ly i nhabite d by the nat ive s 1 5. Instanc es of British pla n n in g in Ca lc u tta w h ic h sta rted m a jorly wit h Wellesley’s Minut e 1 6. The Governm e nt ho u se wa s m a gn if ic ent a n d gra n d to sh ow th e p ower of British 1 7. “ The physical se paration between th e m a ster a n d th e bon d ed m e n was c onspic uo us an d v isible in th e pa la c e.”

1 8. Colo nial Calcutt a: a c ity ba sed on soc ia l d if feren c es of th e Brtish and Indians 1 9. “ Sym bo lic quasi baroqu e v ista s, strict bou n d a ries - Desire for s pat ial c ont rol” 2 0. The Gene ral Post Of f ic e 2 1. The Metcalfe H all 2 2. The Medic al College 2 3. Pre sic ency Co llege 2 4. Calcutt a U nive rsity 2 5. La Mart inie re 2 6. Salt Lake , Maste r Pl a n rec la m ation for seven yea rs to follow 2 7. Grid: Supe rim position of R a d ia l a n d O rth ogon a l 2 8. H ie rarc hy of Roads 2 9. Equal D ist ribut io n of G reen spa c es wit h t he st ate

15

Arunima Sen

Arunima Sen

16

LIST OF FIGURES 3 0. Institutions to se rve a s m a rkers 3 1. Cent ralise d Stat e In stitu tion s 3 2. Grid base d hie rarchic a l d evelopm ent 3 3. Salt Lake Bloc k level roa d 3 4. Salt Lake Bloc k level roa d 3 5. Cent ralise d Stat e In stitu tion s 3 6. Stat e Ow ne d Land keepin g f u ll c ontrol of th e bu ilt env iron m ent wit h t he st ate 3 6. Stat e Ow ne d Land keepin g f u ll c ontrol of th e bu ilt env iron m ent 3 7. N ew Tow n, Ko lkat a M a sterpla n 3 8. H ousing by Privat e f irm s 3 9. Work o pportunities prov id ed by Private players 4 0. Kolkat a Inte rnat io na l Convention Centre: A private d evelopm ent , A wo rld c lass fac ilit y for Kolkata 4 1. Rabindra Tirt ha: an attem pt to rev ive Ben ga li Cu ltu re 4 2. B iswa Bangla or World c la ss Ben ga l ta ken u p a s a b rand to revive be ngali c u ltu re on th er globa l platform 4 3. Int iat ive to revive th e n osta lgia a c ross N orth Kolkata - once an e pito m e of art a n d c u ltu re in th e c ity 4 4. Kolkat a Rive rf ront Bea u tif ic ation Project 4 5. Painting the c it y B lu e a n d W h ite: a ‘n ec essa ry ’ Fa c elif t 4 6. Cultural Institutions th rou gh ou t th e c ity 4 7. The Grid in various tim es in va riou s c a pa c ities 4 8. H om oge niety att em pted by th e state at va riou s tim es a n d ways 4 9. N ewspape r he adlines w h ic h qu estion a n d m oc k th e S tate d ecisions

17

Arunima Sen

1.

INTRODUCTION

1

Arunima Sen

1. The I nd i an Cof fe e ho use at Coll ege S treet, Kolkata , h a s been a seat of polit i ca l d i s cus s ions and dialo gue. One c a n still f in d people d ebatin g over politic a l m anife st ation s, orientation s a n d opin ion s I mag e: http ://ww w. wal ksofkol kata. com / gal l ery. php

The Politically Aware City

Kolkata has always been a city where most of the citizenry is politically aware, has a political orientation of his/her own. Any road side tea joint will have someone or the other discussing the recent political developments, with respect to ideologies or their manifestations. A culturally rich city, it was said to be founded by the British, who transformed it from a collective of three villages to a trade town to a fully flourishing city. However much of the social drift that the British created during their time in Calcutta prevails up to this day. To add, there is more development in the city which reflect the ideologies of the post-independent Governments in the state of West Bengal. There has been an evolution – Socialist to Communist to Populist Governments. With each new Government, a new layer of narrative is added to the city’s identity .

Colonial experience in India based itself on an uneven relationship between the colonizers and the colonized. This disbalance was coming from the myth of the progressive West and uncivilized people in other places. However, the form that was imposed on Indian cities then, gave them a foreign identity and culture, which was further continued in the post-colonial Indian cities. This resulted in a contradictory web of progress and identity, which is still present in the present day context.

3

Arunima Sen

Arunima Sen

4

This thesis looks at how these various forms of ideologies have formed and influenced the built environment of the city. Not overlooking the fact that it will not solely be the political ideologies or power relations that are at play, this project acknowledges the presence of various socio-economic factors as well. It is thus important to understand how political ideologies present their discourses and thus power relations are formed played out. The thesis focuses on the following questions of what meanings do the remains of colonial Calcutta (in the form of built environment) hold today for the people of the city and the architecture community, considering the present surge of development in the city for a newer distinctiveness?

What is the kind of legitimacy that the colonial identity of Calcutta finds in the present time?

On a broader level, if certain tools in architecture and urban form are used to validate power, do those tools always indicate the same symbolisms?

These queries are based on the premise that the built environment is a representation of political legitimacy and hence a tool for identity formation.

This research aims gauge the degree to which architecture and built environment are viewed as instruments of expressing political ideologies and identity creation (on a regional level, in this case). It will help derive relationships between political ideologies and their architectural manifestations and the symbolism attached to such expressions.

5

Arunima Sen

2. Calcutt a d u rin g th e British ru le I m a ge : ht t p s:/ / p u ro n o ko lkata.com/2 0 1 3 /0 7 /1 0 /two-city-vi ews- wood- engravi ngs- from - the- graphi c- 1875- w i th- very - l arge- scans -of -t he-lef t half -and -the-r ig ht-h alf -of- the- engravi ng/ graphi c1875- ol dcourthousest/

3 . Soci al i sti c p att ern of So c iety in Sa lt La ke

4. N eolibera l N ew Tow n

I mag e: sk yscrap er city

Im age: 99acres

5. Kolkat a be ing f re sh ly pa inted to rev ive its sh een Im age: Qui nt

Arunima Sen

6

Plan of this Research

The second chapter “Discourse of Power and Political space� starts with the understanding of political ideology and how it exists with respect to cities. It further talks about Foucault and his understanding of Power and its relations and how they get manifest in the built environment.

Moving on, the third chapter gives a brief about the ideology of the various political parties and structures that governed over Calcutta through Kolkata.

The fourth chapter analyses the British Calcutta urban development – how the city was formed and the forces that made it. The chapter is divided into four major developments that have led to the formation of Calcutta as we see it.

The fifth chapter discusses the post-independent city of Calcutta, as it became Kolkata, how the three Governments have planned or altered the built environment as per their agenda and ideologies. This chapter talks about Salt Lake (during Indian National Congress), New Town (The Left Front) and the Present day city and how it is transforming under the pressures of globalization (All India Trinamool Congress).

The sixth chapter analyses and separates the tools which have been consistently used as representatives of political ideologies in different capacities, in the same city.

The final chapter or the conclusion talks about incidents of subversion that can be regularly seen in a city like Kolkata, because of the politically aware citizens. These stories are snippets of how in everyday life, the common man reverts back with any agenda of destabilizing the power of the State .

7

Arunima Sen

Arunima Sen

8

2.

DISCOURSE OF POWER AND POLITICAL SPACE

9

Arunima Sen

6 . Po litic al ide olo gies get ref lected by th e form s of govern m ent Im age: wordpandi t. com

Arunima Sen

10

Political ideology and the Urban Space

Cities are containers of socio-economic processes. These processes can, thus, be used to understand the complexities of cities. One cannot arguably deny the ephemeral nature of cities as products of deeper and resilient factors pertaining to the ideology of its citizens.

“Space has bee n m o uld e d f ro m historic a l a nd natural elem ents, but this ha s be en a politic a l proces s. Space is po litic a l a nd id eo lo gic a l. It is a product litera lly filled with id eo lo gy.�

(Lefebvre)

The built form becomes the playground for conflicts, cultural associations, aspirations of people, eventually becoming products of ideological processes.

Politics is present in the built form through these ideologies, being manifested through methods of social control and freedom.

Political ideologies manifest various forms- left wing ideologies (democratic socialism, communism), to liberalist, and on to fascist philosophies of the right wing. Contemporary political scenario includes newer concepts of imperialism, and feminism which are more of a pan-political nature. Then there are examples of states like the totalitarian socialist China, or the Islamic countries with feudal setup but functioning at par with the global capitalistic system. These ideologies are all unstable in nature and include tendencies to shift their relationships with each other.

11

Arunima Sen

Arunima Sen

12

In cities, political ideologies affect the built form even at the lowest level. While the built form of socialist cities in China will have uniformity in every element in the built environment and no ‘private’ ownership, the western capitalist cities focushighly on the central business district as part of the entire built form. While many of these ideological interventions are expressed in an intangible way, they are further integrated into the built environment with state level institutions, the private sector buildings which demonstrate the economic processes. Political ideologies are thus put forward as discourses.

Cities are based on an institutionalized idea of society, where individuals engage to organize on a shared discourse. Our societal structure enables multiple power relations that in turn characterize and legitimize the social order. These power relations are based on a discourse, its production and functioning.

“Discours es a re loc i of powe r, they m ust be read from the va nta ge po int not of the author or the intend e d a ud ie nc e, but f ro m the pers pective of how they c o nstitute a power re latio n.”

(Poster)

As power relations are diffused within the complex mechanisms of the society, it becomes interesting to see how these relations are formed and distorted and how ideologies function, within the domain of societal control and resistance.

13

Arunima Sen

Arunima Sen

14

Foucault: Power being Omnipresent

Foucault posited that “power is everywhere,” and that our everyday social life is embedded with power relations. He rejected the idea of a centralized source or authority of power, rather focusing on power being exercised from many different points.

“I t seem s to m e that powe r is ‘a lways a lrea d y there’, that no one is neve r ‘o utsid e ’ it, that there are no m a rgins fo r tho se who brea k with the system to ga m bo l in. But this d o es not entail the nece ssity of a n ine sc a pa ble fo rm of dom ination o r a n a bso lute priv ile ge on the side of the law. To say that one c a n neve r be ‘outside’ powe r d oe s not m e a n that one is trapped and cond e m ned to d efe at no m atter what.”

(Foucault, 141)

Foucault gave the hypothesis that power relations are interwoven with the various other relations like that of production, kinship, family, sexuality. These interconnected relationships generate conditions of domination which is a singular entity, from which localized subdivisions of power emerge. Power relations are never of a binary form, where there is a ‘dominator’ and ‘dominated’. Rather such relations are a multivalent system which can get integrated into overall strategies.

Foucault was not concerned with the “why” or “what” of power relations.

15

Arunima Sen

7. Pano pt ico n : a m ec h a n ism of power I ma g e : http s://ex itthrou g hthep r isonin d u stri al com pl ex. wordpress. com / 2013/ 02/ 19/ bentham s- panopti con/

Arunima Sen

16

Analyzing power relations would thus require asking “how” power relations manifest themselves. These relations are deeply embedded in the social structure.

Based on this dynamic, societal differences, institutionalizations and organizations take place. Contemporary societies ‘governmentalize’ power relations, inducing a form of centrality.

The forms of government- which in a society, is are multiple over a period of time- overlap with, superimpose over, reject, or reinforce each other. Domination is a phenomenon that comes out of differences between adversaries in the forms of government. It results from confrontations and conflicts. Domination often becomes the central phenomenon in a society, together with resistance, as it represents a power relation.

In Discipline and Punish, Foucault uses ‘discipline’ to define power. However discipline here is not used to regulate along the top down ladder, but uses power to make an individual self-regulate. Disciplinarian Power does not function from a centralized point, but is dispersed into the societal structure. Foucault lines out the four aspects of discipline: art of distribution, control of activity, organization of geneses, and composition of forces. These aspects become techniques for various kinds of power relations to work. The architecture becomes a means to ‘gaze’ at the people thereby inflicting control upon them ensuring they will conform. Foucault brings in the Panopticon, a ‘diagram of power’, which introduces the concept of surveillance in the domain of power and its manifestations. The Panopticon ensures that the functioning is orderly and organized, power being the reason of existence for buildings and institutions. The institutions assure order, standardization, regularity which act as control mechanisms. This act of ‘normalization’ makes the individual also become a resource within the power relations.

To analyze power relationships one needs to carefully look at institutions from the vantage point of power relations and not the institutions. However, one cannot simply limit the study of power relations to just the analysis of institutions which may or may not be political in nature.

17

Arunima Sen

8. Fo ucault ’s c on c eption of power relation s I mag e: http :// exi stenti al com i cs. com / com i c/ 175

Arunima Sen

18

The idea of institutions being important is put forward, as they are sites of power and knowledge production. Institutions function within a larger social context, and not in physical isolation. And hence a public space also is added to the domain of the institutions. Foucault considers the built form in the modern period, to be synonymous with isolation and then normalization of an individual. Individual behavior is constantly put under the gaze. The built form is standardized and put under regularity, so as to facilitate the functioning of the city, these attempts also discipline and ‘normalize’ the individuals, an exhibit of the power relations. So the built form takes into account the planning and distribution of the boundaries and networks, so as to enable surveillance, that will help bind, solidify and generate disciplinarian power.

Foucault successfully summarizes the shifts in power relations– top down powers of the sovereign and monarchy to contemporary power structures where in, power is not visible and is, thus, difficult to comprehend. In the sovereign form of power, power is constantly on display, while the citizenry is kept in shadows. The contemporary power structure has this reversed– it is power which seeks invisibility while the subjects on whom it is exercised are made the most visible. It can be said that visibility and surveillance thus work together to create an urban form which produce power/knowledge and enable simple yet disciplined functioning of the city.

19

Arunima Sen

Arunima Sen

20

3.

FROM CALCUTTA TO KOLKATA: POLITICS AND POWER IN THE CITY 21

Arunima Sen

COLONIAL RULE

Viceroy and Governor General

Provinces

Princely states

9. Structure of th e British M on a rc hy over In d ia Im age: A uthor

Arunima Sen

22

“T he im p eria l c re ed re sts upo n a the o ry of law- m a k ing” (Barnet, 21)

The British state was a monarchy ruled over by the Queen. In the Indian Subcontinent, a Governor-General and a Viceroy were appointed who further divided the Indian Territory by creating differences among the Indian Princes (from the Princely States). The British tactically consolidate their ‘Empire,’, by then ruling over the Princely states and the provinces, with the agenda of ‘civilizing’ the Indian Population. They overlooked the already existing social structures in Indian villages an established their own political institutions, a continuum of which is maintained in India till date.

The British are credited with the founding of Calcutta, making it a city from a collective of three villages. Calcutta became the capital for the Indian Subcontinent, the hub from where the rest of the subcontinent would be dominated. The British Empire was thus set up, thus forming a relationship, through which the British controlled the political, economic and social aspects of the Indian societal structure.

However, Calcutta was dirty, air filled with germs and filth, and so were the natives.

Thus, came the need to clean and regulate the public health in the region. Wellesley (the Governor-General in India from 1798 to 1805) in his Minute on Calcutta mentioned the need for order, symmetry and police. As Foucault explains that good health and physical well-being of the population in general is one of the essential objectives of political power. Wellesley’s attempts would thus be to impose public order onto the formation and planning of new public spaces which would be orderly and regulated.

23

Arunima Sen

1 0 . Map of Calc ut ta in 1910 issu ed by th e Ca lc u tta Im provem ent Tru st I mag e: I mag e Del i ver system , Harvard Uni versi ty

Arunima Sen

24

Later, with the taking over of the development regimen by the Lottery Committee1, much of the agenda changed to improving drainage and creating additional roads. Thus came up the College Street, parallel to the Chitpur road, along with several other roads were widened. A hierarchy in the system of roads was also being maintained– roads were of three widths, 100 ft, 70 ft, and 40ft. The major development that took place was mostly in the White Town area of Calcutta. The urban development in North Calcutta, where the natives resided, was based on the lines of the planning in the White Town.

By 1911, when the shifting of the capital was decided, the Calcutta Improvement Trust was setup which looked into the urban development and reformation of the city. The CIT had proposed Haussmann’s Model to be implemented on Calcutta.

This was to be similar to what Paris had seen – regularization of the functions to reduce chaos in the economic activities in the city. There would be a new road system to connect all major nodes, creation of vast open spaces, boulevards and parks, enabling the city to breathe. A number of institutions would be generated as part of this process which would regulate what could be built and where could it be built in the city. However, by then, nationalism had already taken strong roots amongst the native Indians and hence the legislature for all these plans could not be passed. Several other development schemes were looked at after this, which made proposals like diagonal streets cutting through the blocks, further widening of roads, good public transport, etc. The city that became failed to grow, leaving a dense network of streets and built form which was not convenient from a traffic point of view.

1

The Lottery Committee was anticipated by Lord Wellesley, initially to build the Government

house. He had appointed a group of officials who would implement his plans. In the event of the city administration not bearing the cost of town improvement, public lotteries were conducted to raise funds. The first Lottery was conducted in 1784, to build the St. John’s Church, later adding the Town Hall to the list.

25

Arunima Sen

Arunima Sen

26

Post-independence, Congress was the political party to set up its Government in West Bengal. Indian National Congress has socialist democracy as its main ideals. Their main agenda was to achieve a ‘Socialistic pattern of society’, which means a society of just economic and social order based on equality and justice, decentralized economy in the form of small and cottage industries, decentralized political power in the form of village panchayats and state ownership of the means of production with equitable distribution of national wealth, sizeable reduction of disparities, cultural and moral standards, and without exploitation for political and other ends (Mallick, 99).

After the Partition of Bengal, a large population shifted to West Bengal, housing which became a huge problem for the post-independent Bengal Government. Thus as part of the master plan for Calcutta, Salt Lake City was proposed as a satellite town for Calcutta. Salt Lake was built on the eastern side of Calcutta, by filling the wetlands in that region. The development was supposed to be a residential development, on the lines of the sectorial development in Chandigarh.

After the Congress, the Left Front had its government for 34 years. The Left Front followed the ideals of Socialism and Communism and hence focused on all levels of the societal structure. A key point of belief system of the Left Front was the fact that they considered themselves to be as one of the common citizens and never differentiated themselves as leaders separately. Hence a major contribution of this Government was to setup the Panchayat system for West Bengal and bring about land reforms in the smaller towns and villages of Bengal. However, as Globalization started entering the state, the Left Front Government gave in to the neoliberal strategies of development. Thus New Town was conceived as another of the satellite towns around Kolkata. New Town was to serve as the new Central Business District (CBD), in an attempt to relieve the existing Central Kolkata CBD, besides providing housing facilities. However, for both the work opportunities as well as the housing amenities in this new development, the land would be sold to private companies and developers, who would in turn build all the infrastructure.

27

Arunima Sen

POST INDEPENDENCE GOVERNMENT

Elected Representatives of the People

11. Structure of th e Post- in d epen d ent govern m ent Im age: A uthor

Arunima Sen

28

As the Left Front moved towards state sponsored neoliberalism, this was one of the reasons that led to them losing the seat in the Government.

In 2011, All India Trinamool Congress (AITC) came to power, in West Bengal, with the very basic agenda to prevent the State from neoliberal strategies of the past Government. AITC promised to build a new Bengal, one that would revive its culture, not forget its culture, but will also move forward to become a globalized state. They have been standing by the common people and with their actions making a mark at the common man’s heart. As much they openly detest the past Left Front Government and its actions while in power, the AITC’s ideologies can be termed as populist, considering their appeal to the common citizenry and down to earth approach in rooting Bengal to its culture but making it a world class state at the same time.

In the British times, the agenda to rule over the Indians was quite visible, and hence their motive to show the imperial power and impose disciplinarian power on to the natives was made visible and deliberate. The idea of surveillance was upfront, with regulated built environment and geometrized spaces. However, this has changed over the time post- independence. The idea of democracy makes the Government by the people, for the people, of the people. Hence the representatives of the Government are chosen by the people. In such functioning of the Government, the people are put to the forefront, instead of the political ideologies of the Government.

The use of the power relations does not get exhibited openly as was previously in the British Monarchy.

There has been a conscious shift in the way power relations function and their impact has been seen in the built environment of the city Calcutta, as it became Kolkata. The city has seen a constant political flux in terms of ideologies and discourses, thus affecting the built environment, the cultural ethos and the social and economic conditions of the city. In the following chapters I will discuss the various forms of manifestations of political discourses on the built environment, also affected by several other factors.

29

Arunima Sen

Arunima Sen

30

4.

COLONIAL CALCUTTA: TH E BUILT FORM AND TH E POWER RELATIONS 31

Arunima Sen

Arunima Sen

32

“I m agine, im agine eve rything that is glorio us in nature, com b ine d with a ll that is bea utif ul in architecture, a nd yo u c a n fa intly picture to yourse lf what C a lc utta is.�

- William hunter wrote home to his fiancĂŠ (Moorhouse, 4)

It is now already seen that Kolkata has been a site of constant political activism.

Bengali nationalism has been an integral part of the ideological stance of the citizenry. So much so that the political ambition and the power struggles get reflected on perhaps every element of the built environment. From road side railings to boundary walls and colors of houses and public institutions, the built form in Kolkata was and continues to be, the canvas for negotiations and contestations in the political scenario of the state. Thus, power relations can be seen as an integration of everyday life, which revolves around the built environment, the cultural ethos and socio-economic dynamic. Power gets manifested at the individual level, wherein the citizenry gets involved in the reproduction of discourses of power.

33

Arunima Sen

12. The new Fo rt Willia m , w ith th e M a id a n a rou n d it I mag e: http s://puronokol kata. com / 2014/ 02/ 12/ 5152/ Alb umen p h oto by unknow n photgrapher, 1880

13. Chow ringhee, pla c e of British R esid en c es I mag e: http ://www.b l.u k /onlineg allery / onl i neex/ apac/ other/ 019xzz000004322u00006000. htm l Br itish Lib ra ry, Onl i ne G al l ery, Dani el T hom as

Arunima Sen

34

The White Town- A show of Imperial Power

The British produced the image of Calcutta as a problem ridden city. This made them subject the region to a process of modernization, which was based on an ‘ensemble of multiple regulations and institutions’, whose functions were to ensure ‘order, enrichment and health’ (Foucault, 169-170). It was in 1757 that can be said to mark the beginning of the political history in Bengal, leading to the formation of Calcutta.

The settlement along the river Hooghly comprised of three villages – Sutanuti, Kalikata and Gobindapur. The British setup their factories and Fort William, where eventually they British population found themselves settling. The Indian natives lived up north. After the attack by Siraj-ud- Daulah in 1757, the Fort was destroyed as it was ‘a building which many an old house in the country exceeds in its defenses’ (Orme, 126) . The new Fort William which was completed in 17731774 was much stronger and incorporated technological innovations of the period.

It had now replaced the Fort at Madras in terms of strength. Fort William now also had an Esplanade - eventually called the Maidan, all around it. This was to serve as the firing field from the Fort. The new Fort was built further south than the previous location, thus replacing the population that was settled in the village of Gobindapur. These native people were given land in Sutanuti in the north. The period also saw the coming up the Mahratta Ditch, an attempt by the British to prevent Maratha Invasion. The British started settling around the Fort, along the river, while the native Indians lived further inland. An existing pilgrim road that ran north-south from the temple of Chittreswari to the Kali temple further down beyond Gobindapur started attracting settlers. The northern half mostly had the natives living, while the southern half became the British Suburbs, called Chowringhee.

At a basic level, a color coding started becoming prevalent to represent the spatial and cultural differences between the imperial progress and the native areas of pathological spaces. The area around the Fort (along with the Maidan), including Chowringhee, almost up to the Bowbazar Street, came to be known as the White town, while the northern areas with the Indians settlements came to be known as the Black town.

35

Arunima Sen

1 4 . C hi tp ur Road in t he N orth of the W h ite Tow n , wa s m a in ly in h a bited by th e n at i ve s I mag e: http s: / / en. w i ki pedi a. org/ w i ki / Sutanuti S imp son, William, I ndi a A nci ent and Modern Publ i shed i n 1867

Arunima Sen

36

The insistence on such distinctions originated from the imperial impulse for racial distinctions, a vestigial desire from the days of early settlement when the walled city cordoned off the world of Christian inhabitants, banishing the heathens from the privileged Eden (Chattopadhyay, 79).The lines of demarcation of the White and the Black town however often shifted according to the perception of the observer.

Such disparity in the definition of the boundaries lead to the British contain their social and private life in confined spaces with elaborate compound walls. A desire to control spaces by introducing social exclusion and grandeur in the built environment for deliberate differences from the Black town of the natives, was thus being visible in the British agenda.

â€œâ€ŚBlack Calcu tta ( by whic h I m e a n the pa rt where the Natives resid e) , d o es not at a ll interfere with the E uro pea n pa rt, a gre at comfort, for th e Natives a re very d irty, a nd their inhabit atio ns m ere straw huts. O ur hous es are on the o utsid e a nd insid e a ll plastered and white wa shed , whic h is great annoyance to the eyes o n sunny d ay.â€?

(Roberdeau, 110-147)

37

Arunima Sen

15 . I nstances of British planning in Ca lc u tta w h ic h sta rted m a jorly w ith Welles l ey ’s M in u te Arunima Sen

38

Wellesley’s Minute

In 1803, Lord Wellesley, the then Governor-General in India , published his Minute for the improvement of Calcutta. Wellesley’s minute became important as it became the driving force for the urban development in the then Calcutta. His minute thus became the predecessor for all the work that was to be done for the next 100 years.

It anticipated modern town planning in the country, beginning from Calcutta as it had become the capital. As a document, the Minute gives us an insight into the ideologies and agenda of the British, as they started converting Calcutta to a city from a town. Through his Minute, Wellesley attempted to bring order and regularity.

“…T he appearan c e a nd be a uty of the town a re inseparably con ne cted with the he a lth, safety a nd convenience of the inha bita nts, a nd every im provem ent whic h sha ll intro d uc e a gre at d egree of order, sym m etry a nd m a gnif ic enc e in the streets, road s, gha uts, a nd wha rfs, public edifices and private inha bitations, will te nd to m eliorate th e c lim ate , a nd to se c ure a nd prom ote every object of a just a nd sa luta ry syste m of polic e.”

(Dasgupta)

39

Arunima Sen

16 . The G ove rnm e nt ho use was m agn if ic ent a n d gra n d to sh ow th e power of Br i t i s h I mag e: http s://en .wi ki pedi a. org/ w i ki / G overnor- G eneral _of_Indi a F ra s er, J ames Baillie ( 1 7 8 3 -1 8 5 6 ) - F raser, Jam es Bai l l i e (1824) V i ews of Cal cutta and i ts Envi rons

17 . “T he p hys i cal separat io n betwe en th e m a ster a n d th e bon d ed m en wa s c on sp i cu o u s and visible in th e pa la c e.�

I m a ge : B et we e n D o minance, D ep en d en ce, Neg otiation , and Com prom i se: European A rchi tecture and Urban P l anni ng Practi ces in C olonia l I n d ia, S id dhar th a Sen, Journal of P l anni ng Hi story, 2011

Arunima Sen

40

The Government house

Wellesley proposed to build a Governor House and a Town Hall. The Government House was designed on the lines of the Kedleston Hall in Derbyshire, London. The site chosen was immediately to the north of the new Fort William. The Government House was built on a land of 26 acres. It was monumental and grand in its design to represent the imperial power, neo-classical gateways surmounted by sculpted lions and sphinxes- symbols of British triumph over India (Datta, 16) . The Government House was magnificent, set between vast lands all around so the native Indians could see the growing power of the British Raj. All structures in the vicinity— ranging from official buildings to private houses—complemented the design of the Government house and by the end of the first decade of the nineteenth century, Calcutta mirrored classical and imperial city (Metcalf). Economically too, the Government House was extravagantly costly. As Lord Valentia commented:

“T he sum s e xpend e d upo n it have bee n considered a s extrava ga nt by tho se who carry European id ea s a nd E urope a n ec onomy into As ia, but t hey ought to re m e m be r that…

I ndia has to be r ule d f ro m a pa la c e , not f ro m a country house; with the id e a s of a Princ e, not with thos e of a reta il- d e a le r in m uslins a nd ind igo.”

(Davies, 68)

In terms of Foucault, the Government House was used as an object to inspect the Indian population, who in turn were supposed to be stunned by the show of such grandeur of the imperial power.

41

Arunima Sen

Arunima Sen

42

1 8 . C ol oni al Calc ut ta: a c it y base d on soc ia l d if feren c es of th e Brtish a n d In d i a n s Imag e: M ap of Calcu tta f rom actual Survey i n the years 1847- 1849, Publ i shed by John Wal ker

43

Arunima Sen

1 9 . “Symb ol ic quasi baroque vista s, strict bou n d a ries - Desire for spatia l c ont ro l �

I mag e: Tank S quare vi ew, taken from Scotch Church 1847

Arunima Sen

44

The Physical Layout

The Government House with its location paved the way for the future urban development of the city. It was located at one end of an axis, that later came up, with the Writers’ Building on the other end. The Writers’ Building was built initially to house clerks or writers. It was the first three- storey building in Calcutta then and eventually came to serve as the Secretariat of West Bengal post-independence. It was located around the Tank Square which already existed. Around the Tank Square a lot of colonial buildings came up which housed the various official businesses of the British. This includes the General Post Office (mostly known as the GPO), the Central Telegraph Office, the Currency Building, the HSBC Bank Building, the Royal Insurance Building, the Standard Life Insurance Building, etc. This area which came to be known as the Dalhousie Square and surroundings (Tank Square later was renamed Dalhousie Square) formed the center of the British life and development in Calcutta. This development further aggravated the north-south axis, along with a geometric street grid that was being employed. The major arterial roads were made - Chitpur Road (already existed), College Street, Machuabazaar Street, Sobhabazaar Street, Durmahatta Street, which formed superblocks. These superblocks had commercial and mixed use activities lining up the edges while the interiors were residences for the British. The upper class residential area or the Chowringhee area too gave the impression of great regularity and order. The residences were buildings on large pieces of land – with compound walls and decorative railings, which brought in the concept of exclusivity into the British Planning. It was a deliberate attempt to restrict the accessibility of the local people in the British neighborhood.

An obvious zoning can thus be traced in the portion developed by the British for themselves – the place of work- in the buildings around the Tank square, and the residences in Chowringhee. This development was characterized by a regular street pattern, unified terrace housing, and planned sequences of open spaces of ‘squares’ (Evenson). It showed the ‘geometrization of space’ (Datta, 22) , with strict rules of composition and uniformity in legal regulations.

45

Arunima Sen

2 0 . The Ge ne ral Post Of f ice

21. T h e M etc a lfe Ha ll

I ma g e : G e n e ra l Post O f f ice by F ran cis F r ith, 1 8 5 0

Im age: Metcal fe Hal l by Franci s Fri th, 1850

2 2 . The Medic al College

23. Presic en c y College

I ma g e : M e d ic a l C o l leg e, Calcu tta by F rancis F r ith, 1 8 50

Im age: Presi dency Col l ege, Cal cutta by Franci s Fri t h, 1850

2 4 . Calcutt a U nive rsity

25. La M a rtin iere

Ima g e : t h e U n ive rsity, C alcu tta by F rancis F r ith, 1 8 50

Im age: La Marti ni ere School , Cal cutta by Franci s Fri t h, 1850

Arunima Sen

46

The layout clearly demonstrated the growing power of the British state with administrative centrality.

The British also setup quite a number of institutions that included schools, colleges, hospitals besides the Indian Museum, the Government Art College, etc. These institutions after inception were managed and patronized by the Bengali natives who were rich. They contributed to the Bengali modernity even though they were located in the area considered by the British to be the center of the city. The various institutions had become ‘social imaginaries’, where by institutions and not theories are taken up by the society, initially though by an individual or a group, and a particular meaning is attached to it which, over a period of time and through processes of interaction acquires the status of the only meaning, and any other meaning is thus seen as an aberration(Basu, 39) . The meanings given to this region by the State have been appropriated over the years, however, it still enjoys being significant in the Bengali sentiment as the cultural center for the present city of Kolkata.

The British built a city out of the collective of three villages, from where the Indian Subcontinent was ruled for over a century. They showed their power to the native Indians by building grand and magnificent buildings, roads that maintained complete geometry and employed exclusionary measures to prevent filth from the Black Town of the native Indians. They institutionalized what eventually became and defined the Bengali Culture by introducing a modernity that formed an integral part of Calcutta. The colonial ‘domination’ here can be found because of confrontations and conflicts. Power relations here, were centralized in nature, as would be in a sovereign, maintaining a hierarchy. The natives were constantly ‘gazed’ upon, so as to punish them in case of a violation of the law. The White town was planned with distinct geometrical sense, so as to ensure equal distribution, ease in control and better organization to enable a manifestation of disciplinarian power.

The regularity and the order in the built form. - the grid was thus used as an aide to help ‘discipline’ the natives, so as to maintain the colonial discourse of power. The use of power is explicit and is made visibly, irrespective of the subjects.

47

Arunima Sen

Arunima Sen

48

5.

TH E POSTINDEPENDENT CITY

49

Arunima Sen

26. Sa lt La ke,M a ster Pla n I mag e: S atellite town and i ts G radual Merger w i th the Mother Ci ty : C ase S tud y S alt Lake Ci ty Kol kata, A rpi ta Poddar, CEP T , 2014

Arunima Sen

50

Salt Lake City: The Socialistic Pattern

Independence of India led to West Bengal facing a lot of challenges, the primary being the Partition of Bengal and its aftermath. There was suddenly a huge population of migrants entering Calcutta. This led to the State Government facing pressures of land and housing provision. Refugees were mostly from the middle class strata and hence afforded the ‘social capital and ability’ (Bose 95) to pressurize the Government to provide them with adequate housing. Soon enough, the need for housing and land for the population became an electoral issue, which the Government tried to address through The Basic Development Plan in 1966. The Master plan used the strategy of a Bi-nodal development, focusing on CalcuttaHowrah and Kalyani-Bansberia as the two centers for urban development and provide housing to the growing population in the State. These developments would be State driven and were aimed to provide for a third of the total land requirement.

What followed was an endeavor to revive the city’s cultural glory, along with the prospect of a contemporary life style, brought together in a modern planning development. The Salt Lake Township was born in 1964 when it was conceptually conceived as a counter center to the already beaming center at Calcutta. Till then, Calcutta grew in the north-south direction, while spreading in the east. Towards the west were the industrial lands and hence deemed unfit for residential neighborhoods to eventually flourish. An obvious choice thus became the eastern wetlands in Calcutta, which thus needed reclamation. Salt Lake was thus developed 8 km off the main city of Calcutta on salty marshlands, which underwent the process of reclamation for seven years to follow.

51

Arunima Sen

27 . Gr i d : Sup erim position of Radial a n d Ort ho go nal

28. Hiera rc hy of R oa d s

2 9 . E qual Di stribut io n of Green spaces

30. In stitu tion s to serve a s m a r ke rs

31 . C entral ise d Stat e Inst it ut io ns

32. G rid ba sed h iera rc h ic a l d evelo p me nt Im ages: recreated by A ut hor

Arunima Sen

52

Modern planning of Salt Lake

Salt Lake was conceived at a time when India was welcoming modernity and undergoing industrialization. It was one of the few city-level developments that was completely realized among the many conceptual ideas of an ideal city 2. It was built just after Chandigarh was designed and built by Le Corbusier in 1960. These urban developments were proposed to be representatives of India’s leap to modernity. Like Chandigarh, Salt Lake was also a sectorial development – divided into five sectors.

However Chandigarh’s utopian planning did not consider any work opportunities to be incorporated into the master plan. This was taken as a lesson – Sector V of Salt Lake is the Work based Sector where in IT Companies have their offices. Three out of the five sectors in Salt Lake are residential, while the fourth is the central green park, which serves as the city-level public space for the entire development.

Salt Lake was developed during the Congress Government in West Bengal. The Indian National Congress, believed in a socialistic pattern of the society. The motive was also to establish a contemporary life style while referring back to the cultural backdrop that Calcutta boasted off. This, was a state driven initiative, one that was based on Grids – a superimposition of a radial and orthogonal grid, brought together to form a prism shape in plan. The Grid gave an easily understandable urban structure, with simple hierarchical road network, uniformly distributed green spaces for public gatherings. Each sector was further divided into blocks on the basis of the road network.

Here again one can find the use of geometry in city planning. The grid here is used very explicitly for the distribution of various city level amenities. The idea of Socialistic pattern – equal and just social order is being attempted – by the use of a uniform grid that would serve everyone equally. The resultant urban environment however lacks any form of identity – all the nodes of the road network look alike, with lack of interesting spaces for public to indulge.

2

In 1920s Le Corbusier formulated the ideal city, called the Villa Radieuse- a utopian dream to

reunite man within a well ordered environment.

53

Arunima Sen

3 3 . Sal t Lake Bloc k level ro ad

34. S a lt La ke Bloc k level roa d

I mag e: S ou mi Kund u

Im age: Soum i Kundu

35. Ce nt ra lised S tate In stitu tion s I mag e: http s:// en. w i ki pedi a. org/ w i ki / Bi dhannagar

Arunima Sen

54

Navigation in Salt Lake becomes an issue as all the roads look the same with no form of characteristic markers incorporated into the design. Like many other cities which came up during this time (for example, Brasilia), Salt Lake can be places anywhere else, for its lack of cultural rooting to the rest of Calcutta.

Salt Lake was built with a clear purpose of providing housing to ever increasing population influx in Calcutta, most of which belonged to the middle class strata.

Hence as an obvious design solution, the residential development proposed was categorized as 70% apartment buildings and 30% private residences. However while the design underwent implementation, the State reversed the figures, making it 70% private residences and 30% apartment housing. This followed by larger plot sizes made it problematic for the low income group to afford a land or housing in this modern satellite town. Only 10% of the entire housing facilities, was dedicated to low income group housing, while the plot sizes being more than 270 sq. m. made them beyond the reach of the low income group. Thus rendering it obvious that most of the initial occupancy turned out to be from high income groups, who invested in these properties with no immediate desire to move in.

The idea of a strong grid was so integrated in the design of Salt Lake as an urban development that many of the intersections points were supposed to have State sponsored institutions. These institutions were supposed to be landmarks for the otherwise less cognitive development. However the scarcity in funds led to the construction of water tanks at the designated nodes, making them as the landmarks for easy navigation throughout Salt Lake. The only form of Public institutions that Salt Lake has are the Kolkata Municipal Development Authority (KMDA) and Bidhannagar Municipal Corporation (BMC)3 offices around the central park.

3

Salt Lake is also called Bidhannagar in the name of Dr. Bidhan Chandra Roy, who initiated and

conceived the development in 1964. Salt Lake has its own municipal corporation which manages the development and performs the duties of the local body from the State.

55

Arunima Sen

State - Owned

LEASE for 99 years

OWNER 36. St ate Ow ne d L a n d keepin g f u ll c ontrol of the built e nviron m ent w ith th e state I m age: A uthor

Arunima Sen

56

Over the time, the state introduced public places like the City Centre (designed by Charles Correa), which would lure the middle class into settling in Salt Lake. Hence changing the nature of institutions that people would use. The middle income group population was lured into staying in Salt Lake with commercial developments such as the City center and other malls and also with the development of the IT sector – one could easily follow the ideas of the neighborhood concept staying in Salt Lake now. The occupancy rate at Salt Lake has been so slow that it took almost 30 years for it to come at par being a counter center development for Kolkata.

Salt Lake was a state driven development project, where in all the land belonged to the State – plots were leased out to the ‘owners’ (initially for a period of 999 years) for a time period of 99 years. This was another tool which was used being a modern, socialistic development which gave all the population equal opportunities and services. However this meant that an owner could not transfer the property to another prospective buyer, giving all forms of control to the State.

Thus one can see how the Government promised a ‘socialistic pattern of living’ – with the implementation of the master plan as superimposition of two gridsseeming to give the population, ‘equal and just’ services, opportunities and amenities, it still kept the control and regularization in its own hands. Thus the built form is designed such that the power of the state isn’t put into the forefront, but the population is given importance- amenities are regulated and seemingly equally distributed – the very idea of disciplinarian power being manifested. The built form most certainly becomes a geometrically produced device to ‘gaze’ at the individual, thus setting the disciplinarian power relations at play.

57

Arunima Sen

37. N ew Tow n, Kolkata M a sterpla n I mage: N KDA

Arunima Sen

58

New Town: the Neoliberal town

New Town- a peri-urban development in the suburbs of Kolkata was envisaged in the context of economic liberalization on India in 1991. Before that, the communism driven, socialist Left Front Government was focused more on the rural land reforms in the state. The State held ‘pro-poor and anti-privatization’ (Kundu) development ideals. However by the end of the 20th century, the Left Front started asserting the peripheries of Kolkata as suitable sites for the city to grow. With Salt Lake already developed, the eastern fringes of the city seemed to be the natural choice to continue the development of the Kolkata Metropolitan Area (KMA). The new Comprehensive Master plan (1976) consisted of multiple centers, or a polycentric development strategy, to enable a better balance and distribution between the living conditions and work areas. New Town being projected as one of the many centres that KMA will have, it would be a relief to the Central Business District already existing in the Dalhousie area and provide housing solutions to the city’s ever increasing population. With the development of New Town, Private players entered the picture, thus beginning the exploration of State-Private players’ relationship. Thus the State no longer remained a manager of the development process, but also took up the role of an entrepreneur, enabling the commodification of land. The State manages and assigns the Land use – the initial master plan proposal had almost equal amounts of residential and non-residential development.

However with the need of the hour, the figures for the IT companies and Cultural and Health Centres increased.

The New Town development is divided into six Action areas of which Action area I has been fully developed. All the Action areas were planned to have individual facilities and amenities for the residents like local markets, parks, etc. There would be a large nature park and an International Convention Centre in the CBD area.

Each Action Area was designed further to contain residential as well as institutional and IT office areas.

59

Arunima Sen

38. H o u sin g by Private f irm s Im age: A ri j eet Bose

39. Work o pportunities prov id ed by Private players Arunima Sen

60

Here is where the State wanted to have control upon – the urban planning and design in New Town is mostly along the main transit oriented roads, around which the commercial core (IT companies) is put centrally, followed by a grid based development of the residential plots. The typology of the residential development in New Town is apartments, which were again meant for the middle income group of people. But in this situation the Private developers were responsible for the apartment buildings. These private developers misappropriated the master plan and reduced the areas allotted for neighborhood green parks and public spaces and markets etc. As a result what we find in New Town is swanky high end residential apartments sprouting up with great speed. The images the private developers produce of the residential development show posh high-rise apartments that look far from the economic reach and affordability of the Bengali middle income group in Kolkata. The little population who have invested in properties in New town, who actually are residing there, have to travel to Salt Lake for basic market facilities and public spaces. While the residential plots were planned to promote a heterogeneous social development, the high rise apartment buildings and the gated communities are far from producing any form of neighborhood centric environment in the development.

Furthermore what is interesting in New town is the way the IT companies and related commercial activities have been allocated a central portion along the arterial roads. These arterial roads are the major links of connectivity that run throughout the length of the New Town development. If we just look at Action Area I, the commercial activity has been centralized while the grid iron based residential development takes the sidelines. This also is symbolic of the dynamic relationship between the State and Private Firms – a completely neoliberal characteristic being reflected onto the built environment .

61

Arunima Sen

40. Ko lkat a Inte rnat ion a l Convention Centre: A private develo pm e nt , A world c la ss fa c ility for Kolkata I mag e: http s://www.r mjm.com / portfol i o/ kol kata- i nternati onal - conventi on- centrekol kata- i ndi a/

41. Rabindra Tirtha: an attem pt to rev ive Ben ga li Cu ltu re I mag e: http ://ww w. panoram i o. com / photo/ 115033870

Arunima Sen

62

With neoliberalism influencing the state policies and ideologies, the nature of institutions have also changed in New Town. The intent of these institutes is to tap that cultural roots of the Bengali, with a very populist agenda in background. So culturally relevant Rabindra Tirtha4 , Nazrul Tirtha5 have been built, which appeal to the common man’s sentiment of how the Bengali Culture is being revived by the State. The State however also appropriates the identity and meanings attached to these cultural icons. Both Rabindra Tirtha and Nazrul Tirtha were built in remembrance of Rabindranath Tagore (150th birth anniversary) and Kazi Nazrul (115th birth anniversary). Both of them have been used by the State to provide cultural rooting to the otherwise disconnected (from Kolkata) development of New Town. Thus even though New Town is projected and is on the way to become one of the Smart cities in India, it is shown to be connected to the cultural past of Bengal.

New Town was started in the Kolkata peripheries to bring in the neoliberal principles in the development of the built form, so as to bring in capital flows in to West Bengal. In the process, a trial and error relationship between the State Government and the private developers and firms is being explored. As a result, even though the State tries to put forward a homogeneous, regularized and orderly development based on a socialistic background, the presence of private components brings in heterogeneity and a hierarchy that differentiates between the social classes.

4

Named after Rabindranath Tagore

5 Named after Kazi Nazrul

63

Arunima Sen

4 2 . Bi swa B angla o r World c lass Ben ga l ta ken u p a s a bra n d to rev ive ben ga l i cult ure on th er globa l platform I mag e: http: / / w w w. bi swabangl a. i n/

Arunima Sen

64

Biswa Bangla: The World Class Hub of culture

With globalization touching Kolkata, the city saw a coming of malls, high rise office residential buildings which have apartments endorsing nucleated form of living, sectors of IT offices built to relieve the already existing CBD and an instigation to evolve the lifestyle of the Bengali Bhadralok6. The Bengali Bhadralok now started living in apartment buildings and thus shifted to a nucleated form of living, from the previous ‘joint family staying in the north Calcutta courtyard house’. He would now go to the malls to shop, rather than going to Gariahat7 . The face of the built environment in the city started changing from Indo-Saracenic to Modern to Global.

Anthony D. King in his book Writing the Global City, acknowledges the practice of neoliberalism by the state, as one of the phenomenon in the contemporary times. Such authoritative decisions reduce cultural differences, introducing points of homogeneity in the development of the cities. In Kolkata, the influences of neoliberal ideologies were felt as the city was announced to become another London. The idea to imitate London became the central theme to beautify the city, which previously was tainted as the “dying city”. This step, in a way validates Kolkata’s colonial past, yet demonstrates the moving towards a global culture, where one may not be able to differentiate between Park Street, Kolkata and Oxford Street, London.

As the pro-poor Left Front applied neoliberal strategies to bring in development to Bengal, it cost them their seat at the Government (among many other reasons).

This led to All India Trinamool Congress come to power with a totally populist (and socialistic) agenda.

6

Bhadralok is the Bengali term for the middle class man

Gariahat is a South Kolkata area, which is known to be a shopping paradise, full of legendary shops,

7

that have now become a part of the Bengali’s cultural association.

65

Arunima Sen

CM suggests facelift of Kolkata Riverfront

43. Int iat ive to revive th e n osta lgia a c ross N orth Kolkata - o nce an e pito m e of a rt a n d c u ltu re in th e c ity I mage: http: / / w w w. ai tc/ news. i n

Arunima Sen

66

“T he task befo re the new Governm ent is to Rebuild We st B enga l To com pete with the best a nd f ulf ill the as pirations of the pe ople” “A nd a bove a ll, REJUVENAT E TH E C U LTU R E O F TH E STATE TO ONE OF HOPE, RE SILIE NC E A ND INNO VATIO N” (All India Trinamool Congress 25-27)

London Dreams

An immediate decision after coming to power, was Mamata Banerjee planning to transform Kolkata to London. While the city has had its part of romanticizing the colonial modernity it experienced, the present day has eyesores in the form of these colonial structures all over the central business district and around. Kolkata had become a vast (something) of concrete structures and bustees coming up at a random rate, with anything but order and structure in the entire city. The idea found itself even more strength after Mamata Banerjee took a trip to London to meet British officials. RITES Ltd. (Rail India Technical and Engineering Services Ltd.) along with School of Planning and Architecture, New Delhi were given the responsibility to draw up a comprehensive plan for the development of the Kolkata Riverfront as the first step towards beautification. The Kolkata Riverfront project itself comprises of redeveloping a 10km stretch along the River Hooghly on the lines of River Thames. The process of transformation will also see an official

67

Arunima Sen

44. Kolkat a Rive rf ront Bea u tif ic ation Project Im age: Shauvi k Bakshi

Arunima Sen

68

Kolkata Gateway (like Gateway of India in Mumbai), integrated Transportation system, a giant London Eye-like structure, a replica of the Big Ben, an Art Gallery for the local artisans, community gathering spaces and amphitheater amongst other things.

The main aim of this proposition has been to transform Kolkata to a leisure and cultural destination, allowing the metropolis to enjoy facilities of a world class city. Also efforts are being put into retaining and protecting the heritage structures all over Bengal. The chief minister led the way for a Heritage Commission which would start by restoration process of all heritage structures. A museum has been proposed to commemorate and celebrate heritage in Bengal – cultural to physical heritage alike.

The Kolkata Riverfront was put to use mostly during the British rule, with the White Town developing along its banks. However, sheer neglect caused the riverfront to become unavailable to the common people of the city (except at points of ferry stops and Ghats). In such a situation, the State takes the opportunity to give back to the city their public space, with world class facilities that were previously absent. While a considerable amount of State Budget allocation went into the 1.5 km stretch that has been developed, the pilot stretch has been hugely successful in getting back people to their public space. Once again the power of the State becomes completely invisible and the subjects are given priority.

69

Arunima Sen

45. Paint ing t he c it y B lu e a n d W h ite: a ‘n ec essa ry ’ Fa c elif t

Arunima Sen

70

Colors of the City

Color has been a tool for representing power, and this is most easily demonstrated in the city of Kolkata. Previously, red represented the Left Front and its ideologies regarding the struggles. Kolkata was red everywhere – from the Left Front Party offices to the Government buildings to graffiti walls with election messages in red and red flags tucked in almost every nook and corner.

The present Government too has used color as a tool – positing the narrative that the city of Kolkata had been decaying and needed a facelift. The facelift came in the form of every possible element in the built environment being painted blue and white. From street side railings and grills and other street furniture to the newer Government institutions, Kolkata was being painted blue and white. Nabanna, the new secretariat building of the Government (while the Writers’ Building undergoes renovation) was put up with blue and white, along with the rest of the city. The beautification drive also included installation of trident lamp posts throughout the entire city, which were also wrapped with blue and white LED strips.

This idea of color is said to be inspired from Jaipur, which is already known as the “Pink City.”. The blue is said to represent the limitless sky, while white stands for peace. In 2014, any given day, one would find painters putting blue and white on flyover edges, road side kerbs, lamp posts, tree trunks, benches, traffic police booths, etc. The Kolkata Municipal also offered a tax waiver for the financial year 2014-15 for private residential buildings which got painted blue and white.

Here is an attempt to achieve homogeneity through the use of color and thus visual unity. One of the tools of the populist agenda is the idea of homogenization. It is used to make sure that the political space doesn’t get challenged by the influence of any other ideas. The British and various post-independent state governments in Bengal, tried to bring in homogeneity through ordered and regularization of the space and the built form .

71

Arunima Sen

Arunima Sen

72

Cultural symbols and Capital Flows

Changing the identity of a place by changing its name is one of the tools to represent power. In Kolkata, this has been a recurring phenomenon, as the British names to most places and streets in the city have been changed to suit the contemporary times or Bengali legends. Tank Square was titled the Dalhousie Square which was renamed later as BBD Bagh. The rationale for such changes mostly refer back to political ideologies and symbolisms of power.

The present Government has also been instrumental in positing its take on the names of places, streets, townships and even the name of the state itself. From the names of Metro stations to roads, Mamata Banerjee has been renaming roads and places in the city to glorify the culture of Bengal as a whole. The new names (Tollygunj metro Station renamed to Mahanayak Uttam Kumar8, Eastern Metropolitan Bypass renamed to Bishwa Bangla Sarani9) signify the people and instances that root Kolkata back to a Bengali sentiment. So the built environment is being appropriated with these names that signify and are a part of the Bengali Culture. Also this further modulates the meanings and associations that the people of Bengal or otherwise have with the specific names that have been used. For example, six townships around the Kolkata are being renamed, so Siliguri becomes Teesta (a major North Bengal river), while Bolpur becomes Gitabitan (a compilation of Rabindranath Tagore’s songs). Hence the associations of Gitabitan now will not only be limited to it being a song compilation of Rabindranath Tagore and related connotations. It will now also represent the place where Tagore set up his place of teaching (Shantiniketan being in Bolpur). Thus one can find a certain degree of imposition, extending the meanings attached to a certain entity, for the sake of proving the state’s rooting and understanding of the Bengali culture.

8

The famous bengali actor Uttam Kumar has often been referred to as ‘Mahanayak’ or the great

actor. Tollygunj has the Bengali film studios.

9

Bishwa Bangla means World Class Bengal.

73

Arunima Sen

Museum for Mahasweta Devi

Bengal Local Food hub Milan Mela International Trade Centre Biswa Bangla Shopping Mall

Kavita Utsab

Bengal Business Global Summit

Museum of Durga Puja Pandals Biswa Bangla Convention Centre

Biswa Bangla LokSanskriti Utsav

All locations marked here are purely indicative

46. Cult ural Institu tion s th rou gh ou t th e c ity Im age: A uthor

Arunima Sen

74

The present State Government is also working towards developing and further articulating the cultural identity for West Bengal. As a part of that, several museums, shopping malls, festivals are being promoted and held. A very good example would be the Biswa Bangla Shopping Mall – a shopping destination which would sell products and crafts made by local artisans of Bengal who cannot afford to commercialize their work. There is Bengal local food hub , which would be a collective hub for food items that are solely made and found in Bengal. These are various attempts by the State Government to institutionalize the culture of the state. The state here is using these cultural symbols to bring in capital flows.

This makes it appear to the common people that the Government is not using any neoliberal techniques, while appealing to their conscience about how the state itself is concerned about the revival of the culture.

75

Arunima Sen

Arunima Sen

76

6.

REPRESENTATION OF POWER: DECODING THE TO OLS 77

Arunima Sen

Arunima Sen

78

The city of Calcutta, as it evolved and became Kolkata, has always remained a site of culmination, in terms of political ideologies and various forms and their manifestations. The British through their monarchy, the Indian National Congress through the socialistic pattern of society, the Left Front adopting neoliberalism, the Trinamool Congress through their populist institutionalization – have kept the city always a boiling pot where the masses undergo the power/knowledge production, with reference to the various ideologies. The implications of these political ideologies on the built form is found in various capacities. This brings us to the research question: On a broader level, if certain tools in architecture and urban form are used to validate power, do those tools always indicate the same symbolisms?

The Grid

Cities have been forever developed based on grids of various kinds. What grids do is to regularize the design and the planning process. They have been used to show the strong foothold of a king or a ruler over a city or in a communist city, to make an equal society. In case of British Calcutta, the ‘geometrization of space’ (Datta, 22) was used to establish the British supremacy over the native Indians. The British used the regularity in planning to bring about order and good health into the built environment. Hence the orderly planning of the built form was somewhat limited to the extents of White town, while the rest of the region was being developed on those lines. The White Town consisted not only of the British office buildings, but also the residences (the Chowringhee area). As mentioned earlier, there was a visible form of zoning at play – work area around the Dalhousie square, residential at Chowringhee. The residential plots were big plots, with designed railings around them to keep away the natives. Thus exclusionary methods were applied to keep away the natives and to always keep them in awe of the British Power.

79

Arunima Sen

47. The Grid in va riou s tim es in va riou s c a pa c ities Im age: A uthor

Arunima Sen

80

From the Government house to the Writers’ Building, a strong axis was maintained, with grand quasi baroque vistas designed to impress.

This development, led to the development of a proper street network and road widening in the Black town. Thus the grid was a tool for the one with power, to further maintain the social hierarchy.

Post-independence, in the development of Salt Lake, again the grid was being used. This time it was a super imposition of two grids – radial and orthogonal. Salt Lake was supposed to be the ideal for the socialistic pattern of society. It was built at a time when India was undergoing modernity. The grid in Salt Lake thus had completely different connotations. Grid here regularized the development, but was mainly used to ensure an equal and just distribution of resources for the population.

However the implementation strategies in Salt Lake were such that it wasn’t fully a just system. Here too, as a side effect the societal hierarchy got emphasized.

In the New Town, grid was part of the little intervention that the State had in control. The Left front holding communist values believed in a classless society and were pro-poor. However, the development of New Town has been far from any kind of socialistic pattern of society. The residential development even though planned to be a heterogeneous mix of all income groups, is becoming a development again mostly for the upper middle income group and upper income group of people.

81

Arunima Sen

4 8 . Hom oge niety att em pt ed by th e state at va riou s tim es a n d ways Im age: A uthor

Arunima Sen

82

Homogeneity

In all the urban development that has taken place in the Calcutta-Kolkata, over the course of time, all of them can be identified as homogeneous built environments.

Homogeneity as Lefebvre says, “irons out all differing perspectives like a bulldozer or a plane” (Lefebvre, 285).

The White Town in Calcutta was designed to have the work-home separation.

Calcutta during the British rule had clear demarcations of where the work was, where the British stayed and where the natives would stay. So even if one would think that the White town was homogeneous in nature, it really wasn’t. If we have to compare British Calcutta planning to that of New Delhi (when it became the capital of the sub-continent), there too, one would find respective zones dedicated for British Officers residences, British Clerks residences, Indian Princes residences, Indian Clerks residences and then the native population. In the Salt Lake and New Town, the distribution of amenities and services, public spaces being made equal and just, the entire development comes out as a homogeneous grid based socialistic planning. But in both cases perhaps that is the myth. Salt Lake due to the State’s implementation strategies, brought in the income group hierarchy. In New Town, because of the neoliberal approach of development, the private players are projecting and eventually building apartments that are completely utopian in nature for middle and lower income groups of people. Thus leading to the same outcome of most of the residents being from the upper income group while middle and lower income group occupying much lesser residential area.

The present Government is trying to achieve visual unity – another form of homogenization, through the use of color. While many cities have it regulated in their bye laws – the mandate upon color comes with a certain strategy, perhaps to maintain the heritage or so. However, in Kolkata, the decision to paint the city in blue and white has been projected as a facelift necessary to revive the City of Joy. Homogenization is perhaps a common strategy that gets employed, it doesn’t always keep the urban environment as homogeneous as projected, but the State aims for so.

83

Arunima Sen

Arunima Sen

84

7.

STORIES OF SU BVERSION

85

Arunima Sen

Arunima Sen

86

In the previous chapters, I have discussed the various forms of power relations that have existed between the State and the individuals, and their manifestations in the built environment in both Calcutta and Kolkata. The British rule from Calcutta formed an integral part in developing the culture of the city, in informing the Bengali nationalism sentiment further and lending the city its first taste of modernity. However the monarchy put the city (and the entire subcontinent of India) through equations of domination. And hence during the British times, the form subversion that one sees eventually led to the Independence of the Indian Subcontinent. One of the significant examples that can be cited in this regard is when in 1930 three young revolutionaries – Benoy, Badal and Dinesh entered the Writers’ Building to shoot the then Inspector General Col. Simpson. After independence, the Tank Square which was renamed by the British as the Dalhousie Square, was renamed as Benoy Badal Dinesh Bagh or the BBD Bagh.

Post-independence the State being otherwise democratic in nature, there was no domination. The State ideologies have rather been people centric, socialist and populist nature. However it is Power that is being manifest and hence the individuals are being modulated to be in discipline. Instances of subversion have been there now and then, which have been dealt with by the State. For example in Salt Lake, the plots are all State owned and only leased out to the so called owners.

In such a scenario an owner cannot transfer the property to anyone else. However there have been a lot of instances where illegal transferring of the property has taken place for many years. Presently the Government has made the process legal on the provision of a certain sum of money from the original ‘owner’. In New Town, the residents express frustration about the development being a well-planned development, making it difficult to allow any kind of informality into the built environment. In lack of any proper markets of its own right now, residents end up travelling up to Salt Lake. New Town is developing at a very fast rate, owing to the huge hand of privatization. However people in Kolkata do not want to shift there owing to its impersonal nature with absolutely no vitality.

87

Arunima Sen

4 9. N ewspape r he adlines w h ic h qu estion a n d m oc k th e S tate d ec ision s I mag e: T he Indi an Express, LA ti m es

Arunima Sen

88

There is lack of any form of neighborhood culture as is still prevalent in the lanes of North Kolkata. Apartments after apartments are being built with no form of occupancy in them.

The Trinamool Congress Government has not really taken up any pilot project as the previous two Governments did. However, this Government promised to transform the city of Kolkata to the likes of London. The Chief Minister also started the drive to revive the City of Joy and thus for a facelift, painted it Blue blue and Whitewhite. Such radical decisions met with a lot of resistance and subversion. A lot has been written in the newspapers, creating a mockery of the State’s agenda to revive West Bengal as a World Class state with strong cultural rooting. The common examples of such mockery can be found in everyday places and tea joints, where the Bengali Bhadralok speaks of Kolkata becoming London in a sarcastic tone. While many people believe that the city’s new colors are completely ridiculous, a part of the population believes that at least there is a consciousness on part of the State to do something for the city, of course regimental excess never being good.

89

Arunima Sen

REFERENCES All India Trinamool Congress. “West Bengal Assembly Election 2011.” Manifesto.

2011.

Barnet, Richard J. The Roots of War. Penguin Books, 1973.

Basu, Sudipto. “Spatial Imagination and Development in Colonial Calcutta, c.

1850-1900.” History and Sociology of South Asia (2016).

Bose, Pablo Shiladitya. Urban Development in India: Global Indians in the Remaking of Kolkata. Routledge, 2015.

Chattopadhyay, Swati. Representing Calcutta: Modernity, nationalism and the colonial uncanny . Routledge, 2005.

Dasgupta, J N. Bengal Past and Present, XV, Wellesley’s scheme for the improvement of Calcutta. 1917.

Datta, Partho. Planning the City, Urbanization and reform in Calcutta, c. 1800 - c.

1940. Tulika Books, 2012.

Davies, Phillip. Splendours of the Raj. John Murray Publishers, 1985.

Evenson, Norma. The Indian Metropolis. Yale University Press, 1989.

Foucault, Michel. Power/Knowledge, Selected Interviews and other Writings, 19721977 (edited by Colin Gordon). Brighton Harvester Press Limited, 1977.

—. Power/Knowledge: Selected Interviews and Other writings, 1972-1977 (edited

by Colin Gordon). Brighton Harvester Press Limited, 1977.

Arunima Sen

90

Kundu, Ratoola. “’Their houses on our land’: Perforations and blockades in the Planning of New Town Rajarhat, India.” Datta, Ayona and Abdul Shaban.

Mega-urbanization in the global South : fast cities and new urban utopias of the postcolonial state. Routledge, 2017. 224.

Lefebvre, Henri. the Production of Space. Blackwell Publishers, 1991.

—. The Production of Space. Wiley-Blackwell, 1991.

Mallick, Md. Ayub. “Ideology of the Indian National Congress: Political Economy of Socialism and Socialistic Pattern of Society.” IOSR Journal Of Humanities And Social Science (IOSR-JHSS), Volume 12, Issue 2 (2013).

Metcalf, Thomas R. An Imperial Vision: Indian Architecture and Britain’s Raj. Oxford University Press, 2002.

Moorhouse, Geoffrey. Calcutta. London: Weidenfeld and Nicolson, 1971.

Orme, Robert. Account of the Loss of Calcutta, Bengal III. n.d.

Poster, Mark. Foucault, Marxism and Critique. 1984.

Roberdeau, I H T. “A Young Civilian in Bengal in 1805.” Bengal Past and Present, Volume XXIX, no. 57-8 n.d.: 110-147.

91

Arunima Sen

Mapping the temporal shifts in meaning of the U r b a n F o r m , i n p o s t c o l o n i a l Ko l k a t a

Arunima Sen Masters in Architecture CEPT University