The char-bagh: the mythic Garden of Paradise

      A peerless example of the char-bagh in architecture is Humayun’s Tomb, built in memory of Emperor Humayun. Constructed of red sandstone with a dressing of white marble, it is the first substantial example of Mughal architecture. Here, the char-bagh motif has been enlarged and repeated in intricate patterns, generating a whole new world of architectonic concepts, and making this a work of seminal importance among the other great masterpieces of Mughal architecture that were to follow. The extraordinary power mythic beliefs and images exercise on architecture is evident when we compare the Jain cosmograph with the Islamic char-bagh. Both are metaphysical landscapes, but since they are based on profoundly different concepts of the essential nature of man and his context, they lead inevitably to totally different kinds of architecture.

      With the arrival of European colonialists, the myths change again. The Europeans brought new values: science, rationalism, progress—fallouts of the Age of Reason. These found an enthusiastic response in India—possibly because here already existed considerable traditions of mathematics, astronomy and science. With the result that India was affected in profound ways. First, there was the impact of 19th century high-tech railways, post and telegraph services criss-crossing the subcontinent with dazzling speed, changing irrevocably the poorest Indian’s sense of mobility, communication, and hence, aspirations.

      From this impact followed the second consequence. To Indians (as indeed to other Asians) the scientific and technological achievements of the Europeans were primarily an outcome of their attitude towards life. In all of Asia, for so many centuries, we have carried so much baggage. Suddenly a new position was perceived: we were stronger if we did not prejudge any option, in fact, if we did not carry any baggage at all, if the mind was a tabula rasa. To draw on a clean slate must have been a heady message indeed: to invent the future, or more modestly, to invent appliances for everyday comfort—mosquito nets and solar topees and extendable armchairs. Or, more grandly, to invent a new city: Chandigarh. Or most ambitious of all: to reinvent China through a structure of communes! The mythic power of the Age of Reason, like the ones that went before them, are truly mind-blowing.

      Of course, not all colonialists were fascinated by the values of rationalism and science. The vast majority were soldiers, administrators and traders, and to assert their presence (and perhaps to reassure themselves), they imported European architecture and lifestyles to the subcontinent, regardless of any relevance they might have had. Architecture based on the superficial transfer of images from another culture or another age cannot survive; architecture must be generated from the transformation of those images, that is, by expressing anew the mythic beliefs that underly them. Yet sadly, as the decades went by, European architecture in India retreated more and more into a cocoon of remembered symbols and gestures.

      Furthermore, even as these influences were spreading, the intrinsic power of the tabula rasa was running out of steam. Life (or art) drawn on a clean slate can, in time, become quite meaningless—even nihilistic—precisely because it does not carry any baggage, or have any umbilical cord. Quite soon, the brilliantly rational becomes the merely commonsensical, and eventually dwindles into the mundane. In architecture, the frisson of the tabula rasa becomes the stupefying banality of one more high-rise glass box.

      In the process, our lives become impoverished. Ivan Illich has written eloquently about the vital conceptual difference between the cleansing waters of ancient myth and the H2O that is pumped hydraulically through our municipal pipelines. The prosaic architecture we create today is not due just to the banality of the forms we construct, but also due to the mundane briefs we address (which in turn, I guess, reflect the kind of lives we all lead). Would the magnificent kund at Modhera have the same impact on us if it were built for some other purpose—say a drive-in theatre? The form might be identical, but where would be the axis mundi connecting the mythic powers of the water below to the sky above? The sacred realm is a crucial part of our environment, but over the last few decades we have increasingly blanked it out of our consciousness. The price we have paid is incalculable.

      III

      Today, perhaps because of modern communication systems, there are many diverse cultures, lifestyles and value systems simultaneously operative in almost every society. This state of affairs—perceived to be unique to our times—causes confusion and despair. Yet, was life in India really much different in earlier centuries? Perhaps because of its pluralistic construct, Hinduism has always had an astonishing ability to absorb diverse myths—to reinvent them, so to speak, so that they gain new currency. This ability has been of decisive importance to India’s history. With time as man’s perception of his context changed (the cosmos replaced by the char-bagh, the Garden of Paradise by the Age of Reason and so on), the new myths had to be absorbed, ingested, internalized—and finally transformed into a new architecture. India offers countless examples of such transformations—we shall examine just two.

      The first is the Diwan-i-Khas, the audience hall for nobles built by the Mughal emperor Akbar in Fatehpur Sikri. The structure is a small cube, in the centre of which is a monumental column connected to the corners by four bridges. It is generally believed that Akbar used this structure for special audiences. Akbar sat on top of the column with his principal advisers at the far end of each of the bridges. The visitor came in at the lower level and spoke about the problem he faced, or the favour he sought. Akbar could then summon any one of his advisers for conference, without the others intriguing with each other. If, as Le Corbusier said, a house is ‘a Machine for Living’, then surely the Diwan-i-Khas is a magnificent machine for Governing an Empire.

      But it is much more than this. For though the square plan came with Akbar from Central Asia (the square being inherent in the deep-structure of the human mind), to the Hindu craftsmen constructing the building, the square would have represented a mandala, i.e., the