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Journalism of Courage
Ratan Cinema was a landmark building in Lahore in the 1940s, when posters advertised the next entertainer and queues stretched for several kilometres towards the box office. However, what not many in Pune may know is that the theatre was built by Uddhav Mahadeo Apte, whose ancestral home was in the city. Apte returned home after the Partition and went on to help shape Pune’s architectural landscape. Among his lasting works are the Gokhale Institute Library and the Bank of Maharashtra building on Bajirao Road.
Outside the circle of architects and history lovers of Pune, few are aware of Apte. Hallmark buildings rarely display an architect’s name, depriving people who admire the artistry any knowledge of the creators. It is to address this gap that a team led by Sarah Melsens, Maya Dodd and Pushkar Sohoni have led a team to build the Pune Architectural History Archive (PAHA), a free-to-use, online treasure trove of the city’s 20th-century architectural heritage.
The archive is easy and interesting to navigate even for one who has little knowledge in architecture. PAHA has covered 701 buildings, uploaded 17 interviews and packed 7,614 digital objects. Exploring the data throws up surprises, such as how Gokhale Institute looks very different though some of the original buildings still stand.
“Pune has changed rapidly since 2000. Apart from the growth of the city in all directions, we have seen that many buildings and houses within the city are being torn down to be replaced by completely new things. That means that buildings made after 1950 are being rapidly replaced because many of them are built in concrete, a material that has a life of about 50 years,” says Sohoni. “But, because the density of the city is changing, everybody wants to pull down two-storey buildings and replace them with eight-storey buildings. At this rate, the entire history of Pune’s architecture from 1950 to 2000 might disappear in the next 10 years,” he adds.
Sitting at the Gokhale Institute of Politics and Economics, Sohoni points to a building outside. “You see the steel windows on that building? Those kinds of windows are not used anymore. But, once upon a time, they were very big and there was a supplier who made a catalogue,” he says.
Over the years, many architects, contractors, and others who worked on the projects have shut shop. Often, after an architect dies, all the drawings are thrown out. Sometimes, architects do not have the space to preserve the drawings and other records.
PAHA set out to document design history, construction history, the milieu in which the buildings were made, and the architects who built these, among others. A major part of the headway was made by Melsens during her doctoral research. She identified many of the important contributors to Pune’s architectural history.
“Our idea was to trace their histories…can we preserve whatever is left? And surprisingly, many families had kept some drawings, photographs and even correspondence. We don’t merely give data; we have also interviewed many of the collection holders or their descendants. There is an oral history to the collection. Another aspect is a timeline, to help people understand what kinds of styles were used in a particular period and examples of this,” says Melsens.
Among the gems you come across are images of models, including the Pune Municipal Corporation, blueprints made with ammonia and a chemical process that nobody uses anymore in the era of computers, and hand-painted drawings.
Meanwhile, construction activity continues unabated in Pune. An older generation might remember Tilak Road, being full of art deco buildings. Deccan Gymkhana had colonial bungalows. “The next wave of loss we are going to have is a Model Colony, which was built between the 1960s and ‘80s. And already those buildings are disappearing,” says Sohoni.
