My colleagues at PUKAR recently gifted me the coffee table book Bombay Then, Mumbai Now; a concise but splendidly visual book to take you on a journey through the city’s history. The photographs are beautiful, giving the reader a fantastic image of the city that once was and how it has grown to be what it is today.
I started with Bombay Now that has an essay written by Naresh Fernandes. A book on Bombay will not be one unless phrases like ‘cultural melting pot’ and ‘packed like sardines’ are used somewhere or the other. In that, it typically describes the city as crowded, filthy and spirited. It contains plenty of facts that have been talked about in many a blog, book and print article. He does however start with his own experiences of this city, in particular the ‘film shuttlers’ and his home Bandra, that makes the essay quite enjoyable.
Reading on I find that one of the most interesting arguments on this city is very aptly articulated in this statement he makes…‘The suggestion that Mumbai has some magical, innate hardiness has absolved our administrators of the responsibility of actually fixing our problems. No matter how bad things get, they seem to suggest, we have an infinite capacity to cope. But now it’s all too clear that we're wearing thin.’
We are wearing thin!
Bombay Then takes a look into British ruled Bombay up until the mid 1900’s. Unlike Naresh, Jim Masselos takes his reader through a very well crafted picture of Bombay when the ethos of the city was taking roots. He describes a city that once boasted of its beauty in architecture, pride of its citizens in the city and more importantly, its cosmopolitan culture; all three of which over the years seems to have eroded. Nevertheless, the description of the city’s history does make you wonder at its growth and transformation as industry grew through the years. You cannot help but feel nostalgic at the city's better planned past and only wished for it to have continued to the present day.
BOMBAY THEN/MUMBAI NOW: Jim Masselos, Pramod Kapoor, Naresh Fernandes, Chirodeep Chaudhuri; Roli Books Pvt. Ltd., M-75 Greater Kailash II Market, New Delhi-110048.
3 comments:
Wow, great book discussion that makes me wanna have and read this thing!
not to worry, the administrators will find us a new excuse to bear with the thorough lack of infrastructure.it is now a decaying city, no doubt.
It's been decaying for a while; with rather impractical, piecemeal solutions to problems, especially transport.
I do think though that a lot of it has to do with the 'chalega' attitude most of us have. If the citizens of this city do not get vocal about it, not much is going to change.
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