Designing democratic India’s cities: public space for whom?

Abstract

Cities agglomerate power, capital and people. They become the arena where issues that may be pan region or even pan nation play out. India still struggles to see its ideal of democracy percolate into its society or translate into the morphology of its cities. India’s democratic electoral politics are volatile, built on the creations of factions and identities which are multiple and interchangeable. This is often played out spatially in capital cities and at times, space-making becomes the instrument for such confrontations; which is what the paper would attempt to discern and illustrate. Lucknow (U.P.) is a peculiar example. Uttar Pradesh is India’s most populous state and also among the most feudal states socially where elections are predominantly fought along caste and communal lines. The previous chief minister, Ms. Mayawati received much publicity for constructing monumental parks across the city by reclaiming land from the river, demolishing housing colonies and demarcating territory through iconography. Using a blend of colonial grandeur and Buddhist iconography, the built environment projected and glorified the ‘Ambedkarite’ idea of Buddhism as a means for the Dalits to counter upper caste suppression. The study attempts to- firstly, appropriately place the examples being looked at in the study within their own socio-political contexts, and understand earlier theoretical work on social change and architecture. Secondly, situate and understand the transformations to the built in the immediacy of their physical and social and political contexts, as well as the larger socio-political backgrounds. Thirdly, elucidate the processes of the manifestation of the built form - constructions and demolitions both. Fourthly, conduct a spatial analysis of the built and the processes leading up to it with a view to relate them to social processes. And finally, elucidate the relationship between the socio-political processes and the transforming built environment. The processes of the social and spatial transformations are concurrent as the city remains in a constant state of flux where the social and political confrontations play out in the spatial realm of what is proclaimed to be ‘public space’.