Heritage activists decry 'monumental' failure

MUMBAI: Somewhere in Crawford Market, between the carts stacked with white vests and baby shoes, and the shiny marts and roaring taxis, lurks the fast-fading memory of a freedom-fighter.
A more tangible trace of Lokmanya Tilak is also in danger of being forgotten here—Sardar Gruha, the chawl in which Tilak frequently stayed and the room in which he eventually died, still houses the office of his ‘Kesari’ newspaper and a clutch of memorabilia —photos, letters and a majestic white bust.
But unless they were told so, casual visitors would not know that this biscuit-brown building was once the hub of revolutionary activity, attracting visitors like Gandhi and Jinnah. There is no plaque at the narrow entrance. Instead, offices flood its dilapidated floors and shops crowd its entrance.
The state of Sardar Gruha today—standing but forgotten —is a tale repeated across the city. From Rudyard Kipling’s birthplace in the compound of the J.J. School of Arts to B.R. Ambedkar’s home in Dadar, buildings that may not have great architectural value but are of immense historical interest continue to be neglected.
“In other countries, the houses of statesmen and writers are proudly preserved, but here, barring Mani Bhavan which is managed by a private trust, the government has not done this,’’ notes city historian Sharada Dwivedi.
Some heritage activists blame the government, whose efforts at preserving history have been ham-handed at best (like the proposed martyr’s memorial at Fort) and revisionist at worst. Others lament “our lack of a sense of history’’.
But criticism of the conservationists also abounds. Is the city’s heritage movement too confined to Victorian cornices and Gothic gargoyles?
Activists are quick to point out that the seminal 1995 heritage regulations are not restricted to brickand-mortar history but also include traditional cultures by demarcating areas like Banganga, Girgaum and the Bandra villages as heritage precincts.
Structures like Congress House at Grant Road and Rajgriha, Ambedkar’s home in Dadar, don’t figure on the heritage list. But being listed does not always translate into conservation. Both Kipling’s bungalow (whose proposed conversion into a government office caused a furore last week) and Sardar Gruha are on the BMC’s list of 660 protected buildings. While the list describes Sardar Gruha’s physical state of preservation as ‘fair’, there is no barometer to measure its functional well-being.
“The heritage movement is a process and we are still learning,’’ says Cyrus Guzder, a member of the city heritage committee. “If this was Warsaw, and half the city was bombed out in World War II, perhaps we would be trying hard to restore the past. But people have their own sense of gods and history, their own sense of what is important.’’
Mr Guzder acknowledges one great lack—no law allows the government to step in and take over a heritage property. INTACH convenor Tasneem Mehta,who is campaigning to save writer Mulk Raj Anand’s house at Cuffe Parade, echoes this sentiment. “There are laws to limit violations, but no law to prohibit negligence,’’ she says. “A builder can deliberately sabotage a heritage structure by allowing it to collapse.’’
However, in the case of Rajgriha, even though the Ambedkar family was more than willing to give up their home, an official proposal for alternative accommodation has been on hold for ten years.