Sledgehammer In The Armoire Of Philistines

The delectations of history and heritage leave many unmoved, especially votaries of modern architectural monstrosities, the flagpoles of so-called 바카라�progress바카라�. For them, the past, indeed, is a foreign country. Nitish Kumar appears to be at a loss to understand the fuss around a centuries-old building in the Patna Collectorate complex, which his government wants to demolish to construct a ritzy highrise in its place. 바카라�How can an opium warehouse from the colonial times be a historical structure?바카라� the Bihar chief minister wonders. The CM, evidently, hasn바카라�t had time to get into the immensely significant socio-economic role opium played in northern and eastern India, its part in the migration of Indians, its export to China, subsequent resistance and the Opium Wars all the way to the rise of Chinese nationalism.

바카라�People say it is a historical building but as per the report of the Director (Archaeology), it was built by the Dutch East India Company to stock up opium and saltpetre,바카라� Nitish says. 바카라�We also know that shooting of Richard Attenborough바카라�s Gandhi was held there, but these things do not bestow any special historical significance.바카라�

Ahead of the assembly elections due in October-November, Nitish has been on an inauguration spree. He inaugurated six government buildings worth Rs 85.69 crore through a video conference, and laid the foundation of 23 others worth Rs 536.53 crore, which included a five-storey Patna Collectorate complex to be built at an estimated budget of Rs 186 crore. The ambitious project, spread over 3,484 sq. metres, will have 39 buildings, including the district magistrate바카라�s office.

Construction of a new collectorate has been on Nitish바카라�s wishlist for years. 바카라�Owing to damaged structures on Patna Collectorate campus, we have been trying to build a new complex since 2010,바카라� Nitish says. 바카라�But work could not start till now, because the matter was in court. Now, I am happy that the stay on its construction has been lifted.바카라�

His happiness, however, proved ephemeral, as the Supreme Court has ordered a status quo now. Nitish바카라�s rem­arks came after the Patna High Court recently lifted the interim stay while hearing a petition filed by the Patna Chapter of the Indian National Trust For Art and Cultural Heritage (INTACH), challenging the government바카라�s decision to dismantle the old structures. In its judgment, the HC observed that neither the Archaeological Survey of India nor the newly constituted Bihar Urban Arts and Heritage Commission had intervened in declaring the monument a historical one.

The court observed that as per insp­ection reports by experts, the Patna Collectorate complex had no importance from the point of view of history, architecture, art, aesthetics and culture. 바카라�The experts have already exp­ressed their opinion on the issue and, as such, we find no reason to interfere with the same바카라�., 바카라� it said. It further obs­erved, 바카라�In history, there may have been some significance attached to this complex, but that is for the use of storage of opium and saltpetre for commercial purpose바카라�. The building has no significance with art, culture or heritage or with that of any of the movements of the struggle for freedom바카라�. Equally, no celebrated person is associated with the same.바카라�

The Patna Collectorate complex, parts of which are over 250 years old, is situated on the banks of the Ganga. Some of its buildings, especially the rec­ord room and the old district engineer바카라�s office, have high ceilings, huge doors and hanging skylights, and are considered by experts to be the last surviving symbols of Dutch architecture in Bihar. The austerely symmetrical record room, built by the Dutch East India Company, has a colonnaded facade with Tuscan columns. Other British-era structures with mixed Anglo-Dutch architecture dot the complex, such as the DM바카라�s office, which came up later during British rule. The campus was also used as an observation station during the Great Trigonometrical Survey, the landmark 19th century undertaking that aimed to map the entire subcontinent with scientific precision. The Collectorate바카라�s latest brush with prominence was in 1981, when Richard Attenborough shot some scenes of his Oscar-winning movie, Gandhi (1982).

However, as recent developments suggest, mere history does not grant immunity from the wrecking ball of a modern civilisation. According to the Nitish government, the dilapidated buildings on the Collectorate campus are beyond repair and need to be demolished for redevelopment바카라�part of the Smart City project plan. Now, after the SC order, demolition has again been put on hold.

On September 18, while hearing a special leave petition filed by the Patna chapter of INTACH challenging the Patna High Court verdict, the SC ord­ered status quo and sought the Bihar government바카라�s response in two weeks, much to the relief of the heritage lovers who have been running a spirited 바카라�save Patna Collectorate campaign바카라� since 2016.

Kunal Dutt, an independent res­earcher, who has been fighting for heritage preservation in Bihar for over a decade, tells Outlook that Patna바카라�s built heritage, particularly historic but unprotected buildings, has been deliberately left to decay to prepare the ground for their demolition. 바카라�The government says the Collectorate is neither listed under the ASI nor the state archaeology, so, 바카라�it바카라�s not a heritage바카라�, but the truth is that this landmark and other historic structures in Patna and Bihar have been deliberately kept out of the ambit of protection, so they can swing the wrecking ball in the name of development,바카라� Dutt avers.

Incidentally, the Patna Collectorate is not the first pre-Independence complex facing demolition. In 2019, the 100-year-old Gole Market, the city바카라�s first planned municipal market, was knocked down by the Patna Municipal Corporation in the name of the Smart City project. The red-tiled building was designed by New Zealand-born arc­hitect Joseph Fearis Munnings after Patna became the new capital of Bihar and Orissa province in 1912. Similarly, the 1885-built Anjuman Islamia Hall was pulled down in 2018.

바카라�Between 2010 and 2015, several historic buildings were razed, including Bankipore Central Jail and Baoli Hall in Patna City,바카라� says Dutt. 바카라�Ironically, Patna Collectorate, Gole Market, Anjuman Islamia Hall and Baoli Hall were all listed as heritage sites in Patna: A Monumental History, published by the Bihar government in 2008. Since 2016, they have spun the opium warehouse narrative only to delegitimise the historical value of the Collectorate.바카라�

Experts say that the Patna Collectorate is a heritage site by virtue of its age, unique architecture, material and skills used from that era, which cannot be replicated. 바카라�These buildings are our heritage and we must take care of our legacy,바카라� asserts Dutt, at the forefront of the campaign to save the Patna Collectorate, which has found support in over 15 countries, inc­luding the US, the UK, Italy, Iran, Scotland and Canada since 2016. Earlier, it had even presented a restoration and reuse plan for the Dutch-era record room as a 바카라�Collectorate Cafe바카라� to the government and the Patna district administration, but to no avail.

After the arrival of the Dutch, Patna turned into a centre for opium and saltpetre trade. They built many landmark buildings on a sprawling campus along the majestic Ganga that became the seat of the district administration after 1857. INTACH, which has been fighting a legal battle to save the complex, trots out the obvious argument that just because opium was stored in a building does not deprive it of its historic value.

Author-conservationist Yashaswini Sharma, associated with the battle to save the Asiatic Building in Bangalore, concurs. 바카라�The opium trade is part of India바카라�s history. One cannot look at it from a contemporary lens today. It is myopic on part of policy makers not to consider a building as part of heritage just because it once stored opium ,바카라� says the author of Bangalore: The Early City.

Interestingly, the Netherlands gover­nment had also sought to offer help in preserving these buildings. In 2016, the then Dutch ambassador, Alpho­nsus Stoelinga, wrote to the CM to imp­ress upon him the need for pre­s­­e­­r­­ving the 바카라�shared heritage바카라� of the two countries and having it listed under the Bihar state archaeology department.

London-based Gandhi Foundation, too, appealed against the demolition of the Collectorate, where a few iconic scenes of Gandhi were shot. The Dutch-era record room was shown as a jail, while the British-built DM office was shown as a courtroom in the film.

Now, the Supreme Court stay has cheered the champions of culture and heritage across the country and beyond. Renowned historian Irfan Habib says that the whole world believes in protecting and preserving heritage, but 바카라�we have no respect for the past, whether it is history or monuments바카라�. He adds, 바카라�Many European parliaments are 500-600 years old, but we are coming up with something like the Central Vista project to demolish ours, which is less than a 100 years old. If we are all­owed to have our way, we will even get the Taj Mahal razed to the ground.바카라�

According to Habib, one may find the Dutch connection of the Patna Collectorate바카라�s 200-year old buildings interesting from the historical point of view but they want to demolish old structures just to put their names on the plaques on new buildings. 바카라�It is cheap politics, which should be avoided,바카라� he says. 바카라�The cultures and civilisations which have shown utter disregard for the past have not survived.바카라� Can these cornered brick-and-mortar structures see off a warped sense of 바카라�smart바카라� modernity, just as they have survived regimes more steeped in hauteur and self-importance than the current one in Patna? 

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Possible Lives For The Patna Collectorate

• A 233-year-old Danish tavern building at Serampore in West Bengal was restored from a dilapidated state to a beautiful heritage cafe and a lodge on the banks of Hooghly. The Patna Collectorate could be redeveloped on similar lines.
• The buildings, set on a sprawling campus along the Ganga, have impresssive high ceilings. They could be turned into a cultural hub to showcase arts and crafts of Bihar.
• A Patna-themed library can stock all the books and manuscripts related to the city, from ancient Patliputra to modern Patna
• A vibrant multi-utility space integrating artistic, educational and cultural activities along with a cafe and a souvenir shop
• Underused warehouses in Fort Kochi in Kerala have been converted into retail and art spaces. It could be redeveloped in a similar fashion.
• Patna has two museums that house artifacts, but no museum to tell the story of Patna and its evolution. One building of the Collectorate could be transformed into a museum, with a collection of old photographs and paintings to tell the story of the ancient city.
• According to the UK바카라�s Gandhi Foundation, it needs to be preserved, for posterity, not just as a signpost of history, but also as an enduring legacy of Mahatma Gandhi, thanks to the biopic by Richard Attenborough.
• With the Collectorate and other such buildings on the strand, such as Patna College바카라�s administrative building and the Gulzarbagh Press situated along the Ganga, a Dutch-British circuit could be developed in Patna, one of the historic cities in the world