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KARMAYOGIN.
of the climate, yet weeling very unter ally to the food, the lens, the manners, the principles of governing to which we are accustoined, though while we retain are accustome them in principle, we are not unwilling
to make such variatious in detail as will tend to diminish some of the inconveniences experienced in Menced in consequence of the
Put this question, as well as the teaching parity of the climate and entourage, leaving the question of encouraging the art of the country, in in those cases where the building is devoted to the use of natives of the country, to stand on its own merits." You will observe that Mr. Ro
10
apon the style of architecture they are intended to onrich, the decision to adopt European styles in Government and ther buildings must exercise a powerful influener 6pon the practice of all the rafts allled to the building trade, and uilding trade, and through them upon the teaching of the Phools of Art. Yet he was content to
the fine arte, on one side, and to attribute the depressed condition of Indian handicraft chiefly to the opening f the Suez Canal. He considered that the arguments for and against the adop tion of European styles in modern Indian
ldings were sufficiently stated in A per, read before this Society, by Mr. T Roger Smith, FR.I.B.A., in 1973; and and that the question had been since fully considered in connection with the etion of the Queen Victoria Memorial building in Calcutta.
E
I will deal with Mr. Roger Smith's paper first. The gist of his arguments be shown in a few short extracts. ile says: "Let us for consistency's sake he European in art: for art, if it he trne, an expression of national individuality more intense and more truthful shan ustom, fashion, or government. In the stubbornness with which we retain our nationality we resemble the Romans" This doctrine is more briefly expressed pressed by Mr. Kipling's phrase, East is East, and West is West, and never the twain with allineet." The stubbornnes WICH which we have clung to this idea han Leen the main cause of ear difficulties India, but in art matters it is diametrisally opposed to the principles which have been laid down by the Secretary of state, and nominally, at least, accepted is the Government of India.
in
Ar Roger Smith goes on to state three ons which might be brought forward for using an Indian style in Indian public irst it is said, that it is Luildings, "First, it is it is suited to the climate; secondly, that the natives an do it; and lastly, that it is, or o be, very beautiful. "But, he added, "the ufficient auswer, of course, is that it may but that it is not European, h all these, but that it is not far less British. Of the three reason alitled to, by far the most powerful in the one placed first, namely, that Indian achiwhether ther Mohammedean or Hindu, is the offspring of the climate and such better fitted than anything we an import to the circumstances of the is Indian food Country. Very true, but a Indian dress, Indian living, Indian adminetration. They are all the offspring
tecture,
THE ROYA FACTORY
ger Smith treats the matter of the preservation of Indian art as one of altogether inferior importance to that of nursing our own insural prejudices. But now he comes to the root of the matter. "The second reason for employing the styles of the country, namely, that the natives can design and build in them, is answered by the fact that the natives will not be amployed. The buildings which are built for European use and with European funds in India have been invariably built under European supervision and from Euro European designs, and always will be; and though the artificers employed may be natives, yet that does not make the mildings native works any more than the printing in Calcutta of an English hook by Hindu compositors makes it a Hindu book."
The answer to what I must call this extraordinary argument simply is that that there are no public buildings in India, built exclusively for European use and with European fand, and though de facto we unve excluded Indiau architaste from the Public Works Department it has never been laid down by official anthority that they are always to be so excluded.
AFGISTERED TRADEMARK
I do not think that any responsible British statesman of the present day would wish to argue that the design of public buildings in India must always emain in the hands of European.
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we go back to the original reasons for the adoption of European styles in the Public Works Department is easy to un derstand that very little, if any, consi deration has ever been given to artisti e principles; this policy was simply forced pon the department by the artistic and architectural ignorance of its officers. The designing of public buildings was for very many years placed in the lands of military officers or engineers, who had training whatever in architecture an art, and not even the archaeological skill of the average European Architectual draughtsman. The Macaulay doetrine established the departmental principle that iad European art was better than good Indian, ao the Public Works officers instead of using the architectural skill of the Hinda master-builders, as their Ma gul predecessors did under similar cir cumstances, took their Teesquares and set squares, and with the help of European archaeological diagrams, made their paper designs for public buildings in the socalled "classic" style, their choice be iug uinly determined by the fact that this style presents fewer difficulties t the anateur architeet than any other. any other. Eye to this Even to this day, this process of depart mental routine is taught as architecture. to Indian students, in all the engineering colleges of India by the European professors of drawing and design, and these orlaanil exervises ouable the engineer ing graduate of the noiversities to oust ting krane the traditional master-builder from his
inges
bereditary and legitimate employment. The ürst results of these primitive arr bological experiments by the Public Works officers, were sometimes disas trots and dangerous to life and limbs for the Indian workinen employed in executing them. Sometimes the buildings collaperd before they were completed. and acid-uts of a like nature are not l together unknown even in the day.
present
CASH BOXES, LOCKS, &c. Extract from Mr.Jaming Special Repet ou Industrial Sarvey of Bel A (Vide Calcutta Castle, August 26th, 1908)
THE ARYA PACTORY 107, MACHUA RAR ROAD, CALCUTTA, turns out, p
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U NAURUA BABAR RATTL Add:-"TRUNKS, CALCUTTA
Occasionally, it must be admitted, the Puble Works Department has set a bet ter precedent, and among its officers there have been architects of skill, like M. Chisholm ani Mr. Bensington in Madras and Sir Swinton Jacul in Jaipur, wh have sucessfully adapted India style to departmental requirements. But they have hardly solved, the Moguls did, the much more important problema f
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