the maya in monuments: musings on the makes, masks and … · 2015. 10. 3. · the maya in...

INTERNATIONAL JOURNAL OF TRAVEL WRITING Sep ’13, No. 2.4 | www.coldnoon.com

The Maya in Monuments | Siddhartha Chakraborti and Anurima Chanda | p. 133 First Published in Coldnoon: Travel Poetics (Print ISSN 2278-9650 | Online ISSN 2278-9650)

The Maya in Monuments: Musings on the Makes, Masks and Mirages Of Modern Dalit Memorials in NCR and Lucknow

by Siddhartha Chakraborti and Anurima Chanda Citation: Chakraborti, Siddhartha and Anurima Chanda. “The Maya in Monuments: Musings on the Makes, Masks and Mirages of Modern Dalit Memorials in NCR and Lucknow.” Coldnoon: Travel Poetics 2.4 (2013): 133-152. Web. Abstract: The commotion over the creation of “Dalit Monuments” and the encouragement of Dalit Tourism in Uttar Pradesh by Chief Minister, Mayawati brought about a wide range of reactions within and beyond the intelligentsia. The Bahujan Samaj Party and the Uttar Pradesh Governments were widely criticised for their inability to address the central issues of employment, land redistribution, wider health and education. In this backdrop, the creations of ‘new’ monuments were seen by some to be a mere symbolic assertion diverting public money for unnecessary extravagant expenses. Because of the vigorous debate, in a way, the monuments are visited only in a premeditated and mediated manner, having themselves become a part of an imaginary order because of their constant representations This essay and accompanying photographic presentations attempts to ‘visit’, ‘read’ and follow the story behind and beyond the making of the monuments. It demonstrates how the monuments themselves have now become mirages – fleeting inaccessible hopes of sanctuary in the deserts of injustice, or how through an ironical resurrection, the age old hegemony of brahminism has turned the solid brick and concrete monuments of inspiration, into traps of Maya (illusion). Keywords: Dalit Monuments, travel and architecture, Mayawati, BSP, Maya Ambedkar Park, Lucknow, Noida, Delhi, NCR, Brahminism, Dalit architecture



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The Maya in Monuments: Musings on the Makes, Masks and Mirages

of Modern Dalit Memorials in NCR and Lucknow

by Siddhartha Chakraborti and Anurima Chanda

here is no tradition of Dalit Monuments, unless you consider the recently attempted appropriation of ancient Buddhist structures, through an active Dalit assertion. Even these monuments, like the

Sanchi Stupa or the Karle Caves, can hardly be called exclusively ‘Dalit.’ At any rate the actual control of these monuments lies with the Archaelogical Survey of India (ASI), which can perforce be seen as merely allowing “access to a cosmic identification denied [to the Dalits] in many Hindu shrines”(Tartakov, 410).It is in the context of this absence of a Dalit tradition, not only in terms of monuments, but even public space, identity and access that we must approach the recent commotion over the creation of Dalit Monuments and the encouragement of Dalit Tourism in Uttar Pradesh by the former Chief Minister of the State, Mayawati. Being a contested ground, the issue has already brought about a wide range of reactions within and beyond the intelligentsia.

The Bahujan Samaj Party and the Uttar Pradesh Government were widely criticised for their inability to address the central issues of employment, land redistribution, wider health and education. Against this backdrop, the creation of new monuments was seen by some to be a mere symbolic assertion diverting public money for unnecessary extravagant expenses. At the same time, many voices came out in support of these monuments as pioneering the resurrection of the voices of the most downtrodden majority of the country, providing hope and inspiration to the two hundred million who had lived without it for thousands of years.

Through this paper, we hope to discuss some of the intricacies in the politics of building Monuments. As we progressed with the subject, we realised what had happened because of the constant debate on Mayawati’s



monuments, in the media, the internet and elsewhere, was that the quotient of travel to the monument had been effectively suppressed. The debate had taken a life of its own, and the monuments themselves had become inaccessible. Nelson and Olin note in their introduction to Monuments and Memory Made and Unmade:

Social processes surrounding the monument begin even before it is seen. Travel to the monument, like all forms of pilgrimage, transforms object and beholder. The round trip, the full rite de passage…remakes the memories of individuals and connects both object and beholder to larger social structures, thereby inculcating senses of personhood and history that society deems important (6).

It was this elision of mobility – of the round trip – from the debate which we decided to attack through a determined travel to, and actual visiting of, the sites in question. In many ways, travel becomes central to the methodology of this paper, which is aimed at penetrating the mediated and premeditated notions on 21st century Dalit architecture which have taken centre stage today.

The state government of the Bahujan Samaj Party itself saw the monuments as a reason for journey. It projected the new buildings as monuments to the long journey which culminated in the first democratic conferment of power to a party of untouchables, the bahujans, the large majority of the Indian population who had historically been marginalised and silenced: those determined out of the Hindu caste system, those backward scheduled castes, and subhumans who were consistently denied even the most basic of human elements of food, water or education. In some ways, linking the Monuments to Tourism was a strategy aimed at creating a certain monetary logic. Visitors to the monuments would in the long run ‘pay’ for their upkeep, and perhaps even mature as a source of revenue.

Indeed, the monuments are made with the intent to survive the present and break into eternity. They are all in stone, and the statues all in bronze – materials historically proven durable in their fight against the eroding and corroding effects of nature over time. Physically, the structures promise a solidity and presence that one may expect from the Stupas or the Iron Pillar. As befits any public monument, they will last too long, definitely beyond the



immediate urgencies and visions of their commissioners or builders. Writing on Civil War Monument building era, Kirk Savage explains:

Public monuments are the most conservative of commemorative forms precisely because they are meant to last, unchanged, forever. While other things come and go, are lost and forgotten, the monument is supposed to remain a fixed point, stabilizing both the physical and the cognitive landscape (4).

With regard to the above, the potential longevity of this new Dalit architecture has raised some colourful comparisons and comments. Consider the sort of description the journalist Amy Kazmin of the Financial Times conjures to describe the structure in Noida, in many ways, as the grandest of the many built by Mayawati:

Spread over 130 acres, the compound matches London’s St Paul’s Cathedral, Cambodia’s Angkor Wat and Egypt’s Karnak Temple in terms of sheer scale. Only the pyramids are starker; only the Parthenon itself more monumental.

You might call this the new Rome, except it has [only] all the authenticity and originality of a Bollywood set: Mogul-style pavilions here, Buddhist-style domes there, white marble statues everywhere (2009, italic mine).

In a similar vein, Ajoy Bose, the author of Mayawati’s biography, “Behenji: A Political Biography of Mayawati” is quoted by Corey Flintoff of the NPR to have said that the monument: “almost takes you back to antiquity and the old, medieval days and ancient days where the emperors used to build these things...” (2011). While the former ridicules the need for such monuments in its pun on authenticity (reviving also the horrors of authenticity in lineage and caste determination in Hinduism), the latter is an equally spirited defence of these gigantic construction projects. And, both suggest a travel back in time, but more importantly the potential time the monuments will travel into the future. With the comparisons to ancient monuments, the aspect of tourism, which is in common association with monuments in general, too entered the public debate. The debate travelled from the media to blog posts, where in a



blog entitled “India Retold,” the author Vinod Sharma took up the common buzz on the street that the monument was “Grander than the Akshardham Temple”– another modern monument and popular tourist destination – which had the following accredited by the author:

…a temple like the Swaminarayan Akshardham Temple in Delhi has possibly not been built in India for over a thousand years. It is stunning beyond words, transports you into a different world and generates an awe that stays with you. No wonder it is already perhaps the biggest tourist attraction in Delhi, with 70% tourists coming to Delhi visiting it, in addition to Delhiites. It is also Delhi's most impressive architectural landmark that took 300 million man hours to build, in only five years; that is the equivalent of constructing 42 Empire State buildings! (2009).

In case of the Dalit monuments their obvious repeated linkage with

tourism is has been endorsed by the official governmental ratification of ‘Dalit Tourism,’ through the tourism ministry, but perhaps most clearly in the statement by Mayawati herself at the inaugural function on the October 14, 2011, where she attacked the congress government for wasteful expenditure, and went on to clarify how through tourism she intended to have it recouped. As quoted by Dean Nelson of the The Telegraph, Mayawati says:

All opposition parties have a prejudiced attitude towards the Dalits. People are accusing us of spending a lot on this park. We have just spent one per cent of the Uttar Pradesh budget on this project and that cost will be recovered from ticket sales (2011).

What is interesting is that while on the one hand any monument or smarak is a node in a travel, the naming of the monument as a Dalit Prerna Sthal marks a different sort of a stop, a pause for inspiration and rejuvenation in the usual travails of life for a Dalit. Etymologically, ‘travel’ and ‘travail’ are related, with the original meaning involving a sense of difficulty, often inflicted through instrumental torture (“travail,” Online Etymology Dictionary). In some ways the monument becomes a product of travel, and of struggles long and hard through thousands of years, leading to the final vocabulary of a Dalit



political articulation – a process that the erstwhile prime minister of India, PV Narsimha Rao expressed as a “Miracle of Democracy” in 1995.

The Monuments are actually promoting a culture of travel which has its own particular relevance in the context of caste. Within the established geographical confines of the village structure it was much easier to propagate and enforce caste laws. With the coming of modern transport systems, and the growth of urban centres people travelling would seek out others of their own caste in order to cohabit. Amongst the Dalits travel was a luxury not only because they had no money for it, but also because they had no recognizable group with which they could put up. With caste Hindus, even if one did not have relatives, one could always stay in the temple premises, often for free, or for a minimal charge. Similarly, Sikhs would have their Gurudwaras and the Muslims, Mosques. Monuments therefore become tools which facilitate travel. However, till today, Dalits had no monuments, or public spaces to call their own. Despite the best efforts of the government, and the strict laws against untouchability, even today we find that entry into temples, parks and other public spaces, access to drinking water, etc. are severely limited for Dalits. In this context, the creation of these monuments proves an important and objective emancipatory step for the Dalit community. With sprawling grounds, facilities for guests including individual rooms and shared dormitories, the Monuments were designed to ensure that they don’t just become an end to a journey, but create the possibility of its beyond.

With the monuments Mayawati created a special security force, the Special Zone Protection Force (SPZF), distinct from the state police, in order to ensure that they were protected against possible casteist miscreants, and also to give confidence to the Dalit community that their travel security was the responsibility of the government, no matter what the cost. As Atiq Khan reports for The Hindu,

The SZPF proposal envisages the constitution of a battalion comprising about 1,200 security personnel, and would be headed by an ex-Army officer of colonel rank. The recruitment process and the service rules would be the same as applicable elsewhere in the country. About Rs.8 to 9 crore would be spent on constituting the force in the first year and it is likely to be set up by April-end.



To begin with, the security force would be responsible for the security of nine sites, including memorials, museums, parks, statues and galleries built to Dalit icons in Lucknow and Noida (Gautam Buddha Nagar) (2010).

However, as with all journeys, there was a twist on the road. In March 2012, the BSP was swept out of power by a Samajwadi Party (SP) riding high on the charismatic leadership of Akhilesh Singh Yadav. One of the major criticisms that the SP was making against the Mayawati Government was regarding what they projected to be severely wasteful expenditure. Whatever be the reasons, one of the first moves of the new government was to close down the monuments from the public, citing incomplete facilities or some other minor work – such as tiling, or plastering – being incomplete: a stream of constant apologies. Next, the new government declared that the monuments would be opened to the public for functions like marriages, in an attempt to generate revenue. With the changing times, the idea that monuments were perennial structures set up for eternity began to crack. While all monuments do outgrow their own immediate historical context, the incredible speed of the change further underlined that it was not only the building materials which gave stability to a structure, but also the surrounding politics and assertion. As Young points out,

…monuments have long sought to provide a naturalizing locus for memory, in which a state’s triumph and martyrs, its ideals and founding myths are cast as naturally true as the landscape in which they stand. These are the monument’s sustaining illusions, the principles of its seeming longevity and power. But in fact...neither the monument nor its meaning is really everlasting. Both a monument and its significance are constructed in particular times and places, contingent on the political, historical, and aesthetic realities of the moment…(13)

In a report filed by the Press Trust of India (PTI) and carried by The Hindu, the full scale of the changes was brought to public notice for the first time. We are reproducing the full details to give an idea of how complete the restructuring plan was:



“BSP supremo Mayawati’s dream projects, including memorials and parks in the name of Dalit icons in the state capital, would now witness marriages and cultural events with the Akhilesh government deciding to use the space for public purposes.

As per the plan, guest houses constructed at Ramabai Ambedkar ground and adjoining area will be handed over to the estate department besides its administrative building will be used as the Committee’s office.

The administrative offices of other places could now be given to government, semi-government departments, corporations and different bodies on rent.

The dormitories constructed at memorials, parks and rally grounds will be given on rent to government and semi-government departments and the adjoining vacant land could be used for social functions, including marriages and cultural events etc.

Similarly, type four dwellings constructed at Buddha Vihar Shanti Upvan will be handed over to the estate department and canteen at eco-garden be given on rent to a private operator.

The administrative building at Bhimrao Ambedkar Samajik Parivartan Sthal, which was earlier allotted to National Investigative Agency (NIA), would be allotted to the National Rural Health Mission (NRHM), Udyog Bandhu or any other department on rent.

Besides, outer administrative building of the Sthal would be given on rent to police or the home department.

Similarly, Kanshiram green (eco) garden would also be rented out by Estate department.

After leaving space for the annual Lucknow Mahotsava, the remaining space at Ramabai Ambedkar ground would be given on rent for organising expo-marts and other fairs.

The parking place would be given to the state Transport Corporation for inter-state bus terminal.” (2013)

The complete dismantling of the monuments had begun. With the change in the government and the change in the power relations, the resilience of the monuments designed to transcend time was already under probation. Goin back to Nelson and Olin,



The monument expresses the power and sense of the society that gives it meaning. Designed to be permanent, the actual monument…changes constantly as it renegotiates ideals, status, and entitlement, defining the past to affect the present and future. Deprived of its enabling and enabled social networks and left untended, monument and memory disappear (7).

With the Dalits no longer enjoying the centre stage in Uttar Pradesh politics, and having little say or the actual ability to affect policy decisions the fate of the monuments was endangered.

***

The new government had removed the SZPF, and handed over security to the Uttar Pradesh Rajkiya Nirman Nigam (Keelor, 2013). Furthermore, plans included stepping down even that minimum security (because the monuments were already closed) and handing it over to the District magistrate. The complete annihilation of the monuments was underway, amidst negligible protest by the BSP and a few Dalit Intellectuals.

It was at this juncture that we had the chance of visiting both the monuments: in Lucknow and in Noida. The Lucknow monument was interestingly indorsed on us by the auto rickshawallah we had hired, who declared that it was definitely grander than any of the things the nawabs had built, or even the ruins of the Residency. At the same time, we were repeatedly discouraged by many of our acquaintances that there was nothing to see at the Ambedkar Park, and were instead told to join a tour of the city which covered the usual historical places. In a changed and changing Lucknow we were caught in an unusual position. On the one hand we were confronted with a nostalgic past of decadence and tehzeeb which was fast disappearing, and on the other by the assertion of an even older order of a silenced community, fast gaining in their confidence of articulation. One was a mirage, rapidly disappearing, nonetheless fighting for existence in changing climes; the other was a reality eager to project itself. The words of Baudrillard in his “Simulations” rang clear.



When the real is no longer what it used to be, nostalgia assumes its true meaning. There is a proliferation of myths of origin and signs of reality; of second-hand truth, objectivity and authenticity. There is an escalation of the true, of the lived experience; a resurrection of the figurative where the object and substance have disappeared. And there is a panic-stricken production of the real and the referential, above and parallel to the panic of material production...a strategy of the real, neo-real and hyperreal (11-3).

Amidst this flux of time – the flux over the destination of travel – we must understand the underlying role the flux in current politics has to play. This is not a fight solely over architectural merit, aesthetics, or pleasure. It is a fight over assertion of identity, of the assertion of a heritage and of a voice, of the agency of travel. The monuments are not solely objects of beauty, a joy forever, but rather the grounds for a struggle. As Lucknow emerges into a new century,

...which places do or do not become part of heritage and what transformations places undergo in this process of recognition is a key arena for combative struggles of identity and power. It is not simply that heritage places symbolize certain values and beliefs, but that the very transition of these places into heritage is a process whereby identity is defined, debated and contested and where social values are challenged or reproduced (Jacobs, 35).

We could not enter the monument, but even from outside its breath-taking magnitude, along with miles of concrete grounds, made a stark impression. With the sun bearing down on us, even in the relatively pleasant climate it was not difficult to imagine how unbearably hot the grounds would be in full summer. With not a single tree in sight, the visitor would perhaps feel the shock of what it means to be Dalit, or oppressed with nothing or no one to protect him, whatsoever. At the entrance we saw the characteristic statues of Mayawati and Kanshiram, with the former holding on to her handbag on the one side, and another of Babasaheb Ambedkar and Savitribai Phule. Having constantly heard about the so called ugliness or lack of aesthetics of the monument from various quarters, we realised that none of these naysayers had



ever seen the monument themselves. Having taken the equation of travel out of the picture, all that remained was commonplace anger, Brahminical vestiges, and outright derision. We realised that the monument was never visited (for most of its existence it has been closed to the public). It was only pre-visited notions from politically motivated quarters, and the constant re-visitings of the same which had done more to destroy these awe inspiring monuments than the actual governmental strategies.



The enormity of the monument cannot be explained in words. It is

massive. It was impossible to cover the entire monument in one 35 mm camera frame even though we were at least two kilometres away from the structure. With gleaming tiles and the omnipresent elephants the structure has both a theme and a powerful assertion. Even the stupa inspired central structure gives a clear message. True, it was an experience beyond anything else we had seen in the city of winding histories.

Having visited the Dr Bhimrao Ambedkar Samajik Parivartan Prateek Sthal in Lucknow, we were drawn into the entire debate surrounding the monument, and the other monuments. This journey into a different world, of silences and silencing, of struggles and assertions was deeply moving. One could call it a sort of pilgrimage, only the doors to the temples were forever shut. Amidst attempts by the government to have the monuments appropriated, converted into government offices, or even razed (Mishra) we set out on a personal journey to the complex in Noida. We were denied entry even here. On informing that we were students on a project, we were curtly told to approach the Commissioner of police in Lucknow, and get permission.



The doors of the Rashtriya Dalit Prerna Sthal were resolutely closed, and the best we could do was to sneak some photographs from the boundary fence.



We continued our journey to the Ambedkar Memorial, where a single

guard enthusiastically guided us around the museum and the library. Both were completely bereft of people. The library had almost no books. He sadly told us that there was hardly any promotion of the place, and that it was only on the day of Ambedkar Jayanti that some government people would come to lay flowers. We inquired whether they kept the complete works of Ambedkar for sale. No, the guard shook his head and revealed that hardly anything happened there at all. The government had simply set up the place to pay lip service to the Dalit community. Even the house where Babasaheb died had been destroyed by some businessmen who came into the possession of the property after his death. There had been little attempt on the part of anyone to preserve anything. He directed us to the Ambedkar Foundation Library, saying that it was the body in charge of the dissemination Ambedkar’s works. When we reached there, we found another empty reading room which was supposedly the library. The condition of the place was such that they did not have even a single copy of his collected works in English.



In reality, the Dalit monuments have been masked, appropriated, and closed. Through this they have become a part of an imaginary order, which cannot be accessed except from a distant secondary visiting, through and after their representations in the media, or debates about their relevance, or criticism of their aesthetics, even when one visits them physically. The monuments themselves have now become mirages – fleeting inaccessible hopes of sanctuary in the deserts of injustice. Ironically, the monuments built by Mayawati, and the few other governmental memorials, have been assimilated into the modern forms of our ancient complacencies, and their purpose slowly demolished through a systematic and determined campaign, until all that remains is the illusion of the monument, the Maya of the monument has assumed an autonomous existence, over which debates and denouncements continue unabated. Through the closure of travel, through the deferment of the journey, we are again brought into a stasis of inactivity with no possibility of movement. In the words of the 18th century poet, George Keate

No other Noise in this calm Scene is heard, No other Sounds these tranquil Vaults molest, Save the Complainings of some mournful Bird That ever loves in Solitude to rest (Keate).

Is that what we want?



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2011. http://www.npr.org/2011/10/28/141775668/in-india-once-marginalized-now-memorialized. Web. 29/8/13.

Jacobs, Jane. Edge of Empire: Postcolonialism and the City. New York: Routledge. 1996. Keate, George. The Ruins of Netley Abbey, a Poem. London: R. and J. Dodsley, 1764. Keelor, Vandana. “Dalit Park's Security may be given to District Magistrate Soon”. The

Times of India. July 11, 2013. http://articles.timesofindia.indiatimes.com/2013-07-11/noida/40513713_1_dalit-memorials-parks-and-memorials-dalit-park. Web. 29/8/13.

Mishra, Subhash. “Dalit memorials to be razed in Uttar Pradesh.” The New Indian Express. December 4, 2012. http://newindianexpress.com/nation/article1365717.ece. Web. 29/8/13.

Kazmin, Amy. “India’s palaces of the untouchables”. FT Magazine. June 4, 2009. http://www.ft.com/intl/cms/s/0/e01f13f0-44d7-11de-82d6-00144feabdc0.html?siteedition=uk#axzz2dKBGoBUm. Web. 29/8/13.

Khan, Atiq. “Mayawati sets up special force for guarding monuments of Dalit icons.” The Hindu. April 3, 2010. http://www.hindu.com/2010/04/03/stories/2010040365961400.htm. Web. 29/8/13.

Nelson, Dean. “Head of India's poorest state opens £10 million theme park dedicated to her family.” The Telegraph. October 14, 2011. http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/asia/india/8827368/Head-of-Indias-poorest-state-opens-10-million-theme-park-dedicated-to-her-family.html. Web. 29/8/13.

Nelson, Robert S. and Margaret Olin. Eds. “Introduction,” in Monuments and Memory, Made and Unmade. London: The University of Chicago Press, 2003: 6-7.

Savage, Kirk. Standing Soldiers, Kneeling Slaves: Race, War, and Monument in Nineteenth-century America. Princeton University Press, New Jersey, 1999.

Sharma, Vinod K. “Mayawati’s Memorials Mark Epochal Change”. India Retold Blog. July 3, 2009. http://vinodksharma.blogspot.in/2009/07/mayawatis-memorials-mark-epochal-change.html. Web. 29/8/13.



Tartakov, Gary Michael. “Art and Identity: The Rise of a New Buddhist Imagery,” Art Journal, 49.4, (1990):409-416.

“Travail.” Online Etymological Dictionary (etymoline.com). http://etymonline.com/index.php?allowed_in_frame=0&search=travail&searchmod

e=none. Web. 3/9/ 2013. Young, James E. “Memory and Counter-Memory.” Harvard Design Magazine, Special

Edition: “Constructions of Memory: On Monuments Old and New.” 1999: 6-13.

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