Delhi's 100th birthday stirs debate on colonial era

NEW DELHI, Nov 27, 2011 (AFP)

New Delhi reaches 100 next month, not knowing whether to mark the birthday with celebrations of its run-away success or to ignore a date that revives memories of British colonial rule.

On December 12, 1911, King George V called all Indian princes and rulers to a "durbar" pageant on a flat piece of land north of the old city of Delhi and declared the national capital would move there from Calcutta.

The decision, which came as a surprise even to senior British officers, was based on worsening unrest in the Calcutta region and Delhi's more strategic position in the centre of the subcontinent.

One hundred years on, Delhi is a vast mega-city at the heart of India's booming economy with up to 18 million inhabitants living in sprawling low-rise suburbs that stretch across the Yamuna floodplain.

"Yes, there is ambivalence on what to celebrate and how to celebrate," Delhi's chief minister Sheila Dikshit admitted in early November, as questions grow over whether any major events are planned for the city's centenary.

"(The) ministry of culture has to draw up a plan... I feel they don't have a clear direction yet," she added.

The site of the lavish 1911 durbar did not actually become "New Delhi" as ground to the south of the old city was preferred, and the spot instead became a graveyard for British imperial statues discarded after independence in 1947.

Derelict and forgotten for decades, "Coronation Park" is now undergoing a slow renovation process, but it will not be ready for any celebrations on December 12.

For A.G. Krishna Menon, the Delhi head of the Indian National Trust for Art and Cultural Heritage (INTACH), glossing over the events of 100 years ago is to try to re-write the past.

"This is a chance to increase awareness about the city around us," he said. "There is a debate on whether we should be celebrating or not but, as conservationists, we say it is part of history that must be recognised.

"New Delhi was designed by the British but could not have been built anywhere else due to the Indian craftsmen, builders and Indian sensibilities."

In the eyes of many visitors and locals, New Delhi's grand imperial architecture is one of the great sights of India, including the 340-room presidential palace from where the British viceroy once ruled over the nation.

Menon believes the buildings and monuments are now rightly a symbol of national pride. "When I stand there, a lot of things resonate. All of it adds up to a positive idea of the country," he said.

Indians often point out that Delhi was previously a major Mughal capital, and that the "New Delhi" built by British architects Edwin Lutyens and Herbert Baker was just the latest of several cities in the same area.

"This is an occasion to mark 1911 as the re-emergence of Delhi as a capital," said Mahesh Rangarajan, an Indian historian who specialises in the British Raj.

"India lived under an occupying power then, and the British thought they would be here for centuries when they built New Delhi. But the empire was gone just a few years later.

"Colonial rule was often painful, but it is seen here as just another layer of history."

Lutyens himself harboured racist views about the Indian people, and very few locals turned up to celebrate the city's inauguration when it was finally completed in 1931.

Many British tourists often say they are fascinated, if not always proud, of their country's former presence in India, and that they are struck by the lack of bitterness among locals.

Mark Tully, the veteran BBC reporter and doyen of British writers on India, sees the moulding of old Delhi, imperial Delhi and the modern expanding city of today as a reflection of the nation's flexibility.

"It is about Indians' ability to live with variety, to preserve their culture, and yet to be affected by other cultures," he said.

"Some Indians feel very strongly that New Delhi is a colonial imposition and that this date is not something to celebrate, but I think they are in a minority.

"I come from an old British Raj family, and in more than 40 years living here I have never once had that fact thrown in my face. Indians are remarkably mature about their colonial background."

Authorities in Delhi are still promising to arrange some kind of celebrations around December 12, but most residents in the teeming and chaotic city will be unaware of its 100th birthday.

As the city grows rapidly with new metro lines, highways and satellite towns all mushrooming up, many citizens instead look ahead to a new global order in which India itself is becoming a dominant force.


New Delhi's 100th birthday gets barely a nod

NEW DELHI, Dec 12, 2011 (AFP)
The Indian capital of New Delhi marked its 100th birthday on Monday without any official celebrations of a day that revives memories of British rule over the country.

On December 12, 1911, visiting King George V told crowds at an elaborate imperial ceremony that India's capital would be moved from the eastern port of Calcutta to a new city to be built next to the ancient settlement of Delhi.

"New Delhi" was designed on a grand scale with tree-lined boulevards, a 340-room palace for the British viceroy and elegant public buildings -- all of which remain intact today.

The centenary of the decision has been the subject of public lectures and discussion seminars, but there has been no programme or parades organised by city authorities.

The only scheduled event is Sheila Dikshit, the chief minister of Delhi, attending the launch of a book about the series of cities built in the same area over the centuries.

"There is ambivalence on what to celebrate and how to celebrate," Dikshit admitted last month.

While officials have been wary of focusing on the pomp and circumstance of 1911, newspapers have covered the run-up to the anniversary with pages of archive pictures.

"The best may be still to come," the Times of India declared in its editorial on Monday, pointing out that the sprawling city now had about 160 times as many residents as in 1911.

The Hindustan Times printed black-and-white photographs of British architect Edwin Lutyens riding on an elephant to survey the site, and of India Gate, a triumphal arch, under construction before the city was finished in 1931.

"From the seat of government of the British Raj... to the capital of independent India that has grown by leaps and bounds in recent decades, Delhi has indeed come a long way in the last hundred years," said the Mail Today.

Delhi is planning year-long "cultural" celebrations starting in January, government officials told AFP, though no details were available. The park where King George V made his announcement is also being renovated.

A few days after the December 12 declaration, the king and his wife Queen Mary unveiled New Delhi's foundation stone at a spot to the north of the old city near the "durbar" ceremony grounds.

However engineers soon rejected the location as too marshy, and a new site to the south of the existing city was chosen for work to begin.

With India undergoing a dramatic economic transformation in the past 20 years, the country's time under British rule before independence in 1947 has little resonance today for many Indians.

"Colonial rule was often painful, but it is seen here as just another layer of history," historian Mahesh Rangarajan told AFP.

"India lived under an occupying power then, and the British thought they would be here for centuries when they built New Delhi. But the empire was gone just a few years later."

For A.G. Krishna Menon, the Delhi head of the Indian National Trust for Art and Cultural Heritage (INTACH), glossing over the events of 100 years ago is to try to re-write the past.

"As conservationists, we say it is part of history that must be recognised," he said. "New Delhi was designed by the British but could not have been built anywhere else due to the Indian craftsmen, builders and Indian sensibilities."