Absence of the ‘un-exchangeable’ monument: Cinematic design and national identity in a time of partition

ABSTRACT

In the 1954 film Jagriti, a train-trip to the historic sites of the recently-formed Indian nation erases Islamic monuments. A similar sequence enfolds in the 1957 Pakistani film Bedari, which mimics Jagriti. It ignores Pakistan’s shared Islamic past with India. In this absence of Islamic monuments, I argue, lies the potential to question the nation-state’s homogenizing tendencies. I analyze these patriotic films in the context of post-colonial nation-building that was haunted by the trauma of Partition. If the Partition was a time when national identity was created through exchange, potential to challenge that came precisely from that which could not be exchanged – the historic monument. If the monument is central to the formation of the nation’s identity then what are the implications of an Indian film erasing Islamic monuments; and if Pakistan’s very identity depended on it being Islamic, then why must its Indo-Islamic monuments be absent from this film?

KEYWORDS:

• Indian cinema
• Pakistani cinema
• Partition
• Bollywood
• nation
• national identity
• Islamic monuments
• Islamic architecture
• postcolonial

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Acknowledgments

The first version of this essay was presented at a symposium in Chicago in February 2014 titled “The Bodhi Tree and the Orchid,” which honored my doctoral advisers Catherine B. Asher and Frederick M. Asher. This essay is dedicated to them. I am deeply grateful to Rebecca Brown and Deborah Hutton for organizing the symposium and appreciative of all my colleagues who presented at and attended that gathering.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.

Notes

1. In the pre-Partition years, the question of sharing did not arise in the Bombay film industry, but Urdu remained an important aspect of film language and lyrics. Several noted Urdu writers wrote for the film industry. The years after 1947 saw the gradual movement of film people across the borders. Starting in the 1990s, musical and acting talent have been crossing borders but this exchange has faced significant challenges when right wing groups raise vociferous objections.

2. Pre-independence and Partition, Urdu and Hindi were taught in schools to all children regardless of religious affiliation. While in Pakistan Urdu is the official language, in India – Urdu is increasingly and unfortunately being ghettoized as a language associated with the Muslim community.

3. My use of the descriptor Islamic does not reference only a religious identity for the historic architecture or the past in question. Rather, it is short hand for the Sultanate and Mughal polities of the South Asian subcontinent. While these were led by Muslim kings and hence the descriptor, they had a diverse range of non-Muslim personnel in the court, nobility, and military systems.

4. In Jagriti and Bedari, the character’s disability lies in his legs. Shakti/Sabir, the disabled student has one functional leg and therefore walks with crutches.

5. Iron horse is a term used to describe early steam locomotives in the nineteenth-century, Victorian era when horses still powered most machinery.

6. Muhammad bin Qasim was born in the region of Taif (in present day Saudi Arabia) in the late 7th century and went on to be a military commander for the Umayyad caliphate in the early 8th century. It is difficult to name pre-modern polities such as the Umayyads as either Arab or Syrian because they were a diverse and composite group – a characteristic often forgotten by modern nation-states as they try to appropriate complicated pasts and the monuments associated with them.

7. Thanks to David Kaminsky for helping start the discussion of this musical analysis and providing me with some pertinent vocabulary.

8. I am grateful to Pavitra Sundar for the reminder that the 1950s ‘Aao bachon tumhe dikhayen jhanki Hindustan ki’ tune was re-purposed in the 2006 film Lage Raho Munna Bhai (Carry on Munna Bhai).

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Aditi Chandra

Aditi Chandra is assistant professor of art history/visual studies at the University of California, Merced. Her research examines how colonial and post-colonial processes such as landscaping, site museums, postcards, and the eviction of refugees, produced Delhi’s Islamic architecture into modern, tourist monuments in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. She also examines how these physically transformative practices were questioned by non-elite publics at the margins of society making the modern monument a powerful space with the potential of disrupting State authority. She has curated exhibitions titled ‘Imperial Post: Views of Colonial Delhi’ and ‘Waterscapes & Wet Bodies through the Colonial Eye: West Africa, Hawai’i, and India’ which showcased visual travel ephemera.