I’m unapologetically modernist. To me, history only runs forward, and yesterday is usually an embarrassing old version 1.0. If you saw my questionable fashion choices from years past, you’d hasten to agree.
Given my technobarbarian predilections, this NYT story extolling the virtues of housing Bangalore tech workers in former tobacco warehouses strikes me as nothing more than the romanticization of poverty:
In contrast to these unabashed clones of buildings in Palo Alto or San Jose is a 37-acre campus in the heart of the city whose granite- and terra cotta-adorned buildings are set among decades-old trees and painted in vibrant Indian shades of brick red and deep green. The buildings have names from the ancient Indian language of Sanskrit, while the rooms within are named after the ancient books of learning, the Vedas. Every morning the Indian flag is ceremonially hoisted on a central flagpole, an unusual practice for businesses here… most of the streets have been paved with local stone… walls made of hollow terra-cotta blocks, flat stone tables and acoustic-friendly ceilings that are fashioned out of earthen pots. The giant century-old chimney, ancient trees and even an old fire station have been left standing… [Link]
Crappy old clay buildings, unpaved streets, giving buildings names in local languages? In India that’s not called ‘environmentally friendly’ architecture. That’s called all architecture 
The NYT’s spin feels to me like the wealthy patting the pre-industrial on the head. It’s a yearning you only get after industrializing:
… Galapagos Bar… reminded me a hell of a lot of a cement factory in India, with a dank pool taking up most of the space, stone walls with hand-lit candles mounted in odd places, not the least behind rows of expensive vodkas. The charms of the torture castle, the provincial, it’s the classic example of art defining itself as other. Even when other means pre-industrial… in developing countries this would not have been recognizable as a chi-chi place in the art sense, handmade is the order of the day and not as admired as standardized and mass-produced… [Link]
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The renovating architect drew inspiration from The Fountainhead. Ironically, the illustrations on Ayn Rand’s popular edition covers are not about building for human scale at all. They’re soaring neo-Gothic works which draw inspiration from the spires of Soviet universities, albeit stripped of communist symbols. They’re Rockefeller Center. Skyscrapers move books, even when they contradict the book’s aesthetic
Mr. Jaisim, whose firm is named Jaisim Fountainhead, in reference to the Ayn Rand novel, said his work had always been defined by the book’s central character, the architect Howard Roark. “I read the book in the 1960’s; it has been my moral guideline ever since,” he said. The book influenced him to work on his own terms and abhor commercialism, he said. [Link]
Now this is more like it. Let’s first build some skyscrapers before saying we’ve overdosed. Even the low-rise city of London kvetches that it wants a more memorable skyline, Erotic Gherkin or no:
“Every company wants to outdo the other,” said Mr. Sagar, citing the spaceship- and Sydney Opera House-inspired food courts at Infosys’s headquarters and its plans to build origami-shaped buildings in nearby Mysore. “Companies like Infosys and Wipro have the power to shape Bangalore’s skyline,” he said, “and so they should.” [Link]
Is there any more apt passage about technology than this one about the raw mastery of nature? Howard Roark was a terraformer.
Howard Roark laughed… He looked at the granite. To be cut, he thought, and made into walls. He looked at a tree. To be split and made into rafters. He looked at a streak of rust on the stone and thought of iron ore under the ground. To be melted and to emerge as girders against the sky. These rocks, he thought, are here for me; waiting for the drill, the dynamite and my voice; waiting to be split, ripped, pounded, reborn; waiting for the shape my hands will give them. [Link]
Hey, I was there for a quiz a month ago. It’s not clay and unpaved streets at all- brick and concrete and tarred roads all the way.
The four rooms are called Rigveda, Samaveda, Yajurveda and Atharvaveda, which is the Indian naming scheme they were talking about. I don’t see the big deal- other campuses (Honeywell for example) have Mars, Jupiter, Saturn and Mercury. If you’ve got Indian techies both naming schemes are equally familiar.
The new buildings over there are pretty lovely though. I haven’t RTFA but the excerpt here doesn’t mention the aquarium they have with ornamental fish.
The hollow bricks also keep the building much cooler than the rest of the campus.
Manish, that bit from the Fountainhead is the most terrifying thing I’ve read in a long while. Also reminds me once again why I’ve been disinclined to read the novel. Do you really find that sort of ‘mastery of nature’ inspiring?
I find the romaticization of poverty quite irritating too, but balk at this sort of headlong, trendy skyscraper- mania. Wanna bet that in 25 years, most of these expensive skylines will be regarded as eyesores? The Leisure Suits of the ’00s.
You mean penicillin, moonshots and robots? Oh yeah. Power is morally neutral, it’s how you apply it. In fact, the Roarkian aesthetic in the book is about applying power to build humanistically, not a bland, corporate skyscraper but an innovative, low-rise temple to humanity.
Since many skyscrapers are over a century old now, I don’t see that happening. The trend is in the opposite direction– ever-taller.
if supposedly intelligent people have ideas about architecture such as manish, i’m not surprised that most of the architecture in india in recent years is so banal.
is this post serious? does this person have any idea at all about evironmental sustainability, energy-efficiency, the scope for building using local technologies and methods and the ability to deal better with the extremes of the indian climate? i mean, honestly, this is one of the most incredibly stupid, ill-informed, and ignorant pieces of writing i’ve read in a long time.
and no, manish, to try and be ‘sustainable’ is not some new-fangled ‘western’, romantic idea. it’s precisely the lack of attention to the environmental consequences and character of much that has been built in india over the last 50 years that has led to such a degradation of the built environment. compare, if you will, the havelis of jaisalmer to the DDA flats of new delhi.
anyway, i’m assuming that the views of the writer of this post were meant ot be a joke, because otherwise .. sheesh. for god’s sake, have some idea about stuff you write about. google laurie baker, charles correa, joseph stein, louis kahn,etc. read. look around. perhaps then you will stop churning out crap about topics you don’t understand.
sheesh.
so, by the way, do you think the conversion of old warehouses into lofts in new york or boston is ‘romanticising poverty’? or is a desire to preserve and work with spaces that have some history, some presence, and some character only something which the first world has the right to do? to me, the campus described in the NY Times article sounds like one of the most intelligent and characterful yet utilitarian and aesthetically pleasing re-use projects i’ve heard about in a corporate setting. is the neemrana fort restoration/conversion somehow also bad? should we just tear down what little is left of our past, often things built with a better understanding of the environment in which they are situated than much of what has been built in recent years, and replace it with a giant middle-american-style mall? how idiotic is it possible to be? lord, what a complete philistine this person is – the epitome of clueless NRI spouting off about everything from an uninformed, ignorant, utterly philistine perspective of one reared in the aesthetic and cultural wilderness of middle america. yuck.
Wanna bet that in 25 years, most of these expensive skylines will be regarded as eyesores? The Leisure Suits of the ’00s.
old and romantic is relative. i always like to joke to my gf, who loves trains as ‘slow’ and ‘old fashioned,’ that in the 1830s novelists and intellectuals were loudly declaring how the train ushered the death of the leisurely and ineffably romatnic carriage ride across the south of england….
It is somewhat tongue-in-cheek. My complaint is with the spin of the NYT story and the specific building above. My aesthetic is more glass, wide-open, well-lit, Calatrava and (when I’m feeling playful) Gaudà than tobacco godown.
I didn’t notice where I attacked sustainability, but have fun torching your strawman. I’m familiar with most of those references, thanks. Here’s a great one you should check out about Iranian wind catchers.
I live in one. It’s glass, wide-open, well-lit.
Thank you kindly, I’m here all week. By the way, you left out nescient, unconversant, benighted, unlettered and witless. They’re fun to toss in every once in awhile as pieces of flair.
The thing that I have yet to fully explain to myself is the devotion that so many desi men to Ayn Rand.
Theories anyone?
Simple– many are engineers. They’re used to reshaping their world, they do it day in and day out. That passage in The Fountainhead is catnip for indie-minded builders.
the devotion that so many desi men to Ayn Rand.
Dominique Francon or Dagny Taggart fantasies?
i’ve heard, btw, that most hard-core objectivists are still jewish, just as the original circle around rand was (the brandens, greenspan, peikoff, etc., rand herself obviously).
‘I live in one. It’s glass, wide-open, well-lit.’
of course, glass, wide-open, well-lit is exactly what would work well and be *incredibly8 energy-efficient in bangalore’s (or anywhere else in india’s) climate, innit?
unfortunately, what’s scary is that a lot of architects think like you. which is terrifying – if you’ve been to gurgaon, you will know what i mean.
but wait, you probably loved it because it reminded you of USA, and everything looked so … ummm … american?
reminds me of the ABCDs i used to see looking at the menu (or whatever it’s caleld ‘ in nirula’s in the days before mcdonald’s, and complaining loudly in their american accents ‘but why don’t they just have big macs here?’
🙂
I’m all for energy efficiency, but Bangalore tech companies’ #1 problem is recruiting and high turnover, sometimes approaching 25% a year, not G&A. The glass building would draw more recruits than the dark warehouse. Except for sys admins and hardcore devs– they love them their darkness 😉
Yeah, you know, this is so ugly.
Yes, let’s restrict malls to America, Indians are too authentic for that. That’s why they just hate buying foreign goods. Hell, let’s heavily tax foreign goods, subsidize state industries and nationalize companies at will. It’s the ideal pre-industrial state.
While you’re stereotyping, you might as well stereotype accurately– NRIs bitching that K3G is too Western to fit their village-tinted memories.
Actually, the crassest people you’ll meet are the business class in newly developing nations. In industrialized countries, gold-plated faucets are already passé.
nationalize companies at will
isn’t that an unauthentic western idea? let’s go back to village economies baby! think local, make local, buy local, born local, die local, oppress local, shit-in-the-fields local…if it’s local, it’s all good!
There are a good many desi women who prefer Rand too. I think the attraction lies in tradition, both as a result of faith as well as circumstance. The chances of someone taking to Rand are probably higher in people raised in a “waste not want not” environment. This could be the result of anything from the ‘Protestant Ethic’ to a plain lack of disposable income. All in all, it ain’t a bad strategy, especially for architecture. Our history has seen enough waste of material on massive domes and pillars, littered with precious metals and stone, to satisfy some imperial overweening ambition. That was good while it lasted but we can ill-afford it today.
Crappy old clay buildings, unpaved streets, giving buildings names in local languages?
Ummm…well, they are named in Sanskrit, a language that is not widely read, spoken or written in Karnataka as far as I know. But seeing that you have lumped this along with crappy old buildings and unpaved streets in the same sentence, please do tell why it offends your aesthetic sensibilities that they have named their rooms in a classical Indian language – one that happens to be the antecedent of the largest linguistic group in the world? If Microsoft had named their conference rooms in Latin in their glass-and-steel buildings in Seattle, would that be equally offensive to you too?
It is historically local to India just as Latin is to Italy.
It doesn’t, it’s a nice touch.
Please do tell why you keep commenting on my posts when you don’t get my sense of humor? Move along, there’s nothing to see here– just another unlettered blogger braying badly-written words.
Yes, see the taller higher extremist trend is what I meant, not the old beautiful Chrylser building-era skycrapers.
Hmm…I might be talking myself into a corner here…in fact I see walls closing in on either side of me.. I guess my point is that, of course, applied science (i.e. technology) is mad useful and we’d be stupid to romanticize the past..but to only see nature for its utilitarian value, as in the Rand passage in the post..to see humans deified to that degree…frankly, disturbs me.
penicillin? cheap shot, Manish 🙂
Forgive me…I was thrown off by what you described as romanticization of poverty and continuing in the same vein for the next few lines and end up with describing these features as spin. Please enlighten me where the humour in this is. I ask this in all seriousnees, Manish : please, please tell me how this is funny because I have tried very hard to find it but came up with nothing. I am certain that my utterly unrefined sense of appreciating humour can use help from you.
just out of curiosity, did anyone else see the humour in there or am I the only numbskull around here?
This is like the discussion about soldiers. If there’s one trait you want in your republic’s engineers, it’s that whenever they look at something they wonder, ‘What could I build with this?’
i thought it was funny.
gb says: did anyone else see the humour in there or am I the only numbskull around here?
Umm, yeah, I think its just you.
I’m with SoG. Manish, I highly recommend this book (assuming you haven’t already), illustrating what is possible with contemporary design that hearkens to traditional Indian forms without sacrificing contemporary utility/functionality: http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/071483646X/qid=1124747209/sr=8-1/ref=pd_bbs_1/103-0686337-7759803?v=glance&s=books&n=507846
Umair, at the risk of ruining the joke, this is not a post about sustainable architecture at all. It’s a post about a very specific absurdity.
About architecture: the most advanced, industrialized examples, including Calatrava’s, usually include envio-friendly features as long as the backers are willing. I dislike the building the NYT holds up as an example on purely aesthetic grounds. And none of that has anything to do with the point of the post.
Manish: just so I’m clear, what is your AESTHETIC objection to the building in question?
My take on this building isn’t even in the post. But since you ask, its design is dated. It’s squat. It has too few windows to get decent light, unless there are skylights not mentioned in the story. It’s painted an appalling shade of green and uses a dorky ribbon pattern. It basically looks like an American cinder block prison or high school, which are pretty much the same thing 😉
Environmental profile is fairly orthogonal to visual design, though not totally divorced. Like the original Freedom Tower design, you can have lots of light and a modern look while still being envio-friendly. Bangalore’s temperate climate is nothing like the desert around Bam, the kind of climate which requires adobe and wind catchers.
Manish- I see you edited your comment – something about the NYT article implying that a country already benefiting from development is preaching to poorer countries not to develop…I can only assume that’s still what you mean by a “very specific absurdity” above? A software company which EXISTS because of modernization can hardly be accused of preaching against development. I don’t think there’s anything problematic with the article OR with what ITC Infotech is doing. In a world of clones, they’re trying to set themselves apart – “modernization with an Indian touch.” What’s your objection to that, other than aesthetic, which you correctly state isn’t the point of your post at all? Does all progress have to look identical? Wouldn’t that make for a boring world?
The NYT is doing the preaching.
It seems that at least some folks in India actually like the building, so it’s hard to argue that the “yearning” doesn’t exist there.
Also, this is the strangest interpretation of The Fountainhead I’ve ever come across–“tradition,” “faith,” “waste not want not”–are we talking about the same book that has inspired the American right to treat the environment as its God-given plaything? Skyscrapers are the book’s asesthetic. Or is the book interpreted differently in India?
Manish
As an architect practising here in NYC, I find your reference to Calatrava intriguing. He is not the first person that comes to mind when architects are designed. Nevertheless, he is an architects par-excellence.
Looking at a picture of the building, in question, I would agree with Manish on many accounts. The paint scheme and the unnecessary use of funky wavy lines, is pure kitsch, sadly something which Indian architects still embrace, more as a remnant of neo-classicism of the US circa 1980. Mr Hafeez Contractor, being the leading “pioneer” in this.
Energy efficiency is another ballgame altogether, and sadly what works in one region will never work in the other. A very deep understanding of climate, and material is necessary. Ken Yeang a pioneering Malaysian architect designs bio-skyscrapers for hot humid climates. His solutions wont work in climates outside hot humid areas.
Currently I am working on this project in Manhattan called One Bryant Park. Have been on this for over 3 years and will be on it till 2008, when it finishes. Besides being the second tallest building in NYC when it finishes, it will be the largest energy efficient building in the world.
This excerpt will give one an idea of how energy-efficiency is tackled.
More info about the architects and the building.
Quite the opposite. You’ve been misled by the cover 😉 This is a building which the protagonist designs:
The Temple was to be a small building of gray limestone. Its lines were horizontal, not the lines reaching to heaven, but the lines of the earth. It seemed to spread over the ground like arms outstretched at shoulder-height, palms down, in great, silent acceptance. It did not cling to the soil and it did not crouch under the sky. It seemed to lift the earth, and its few vertical shafts pulled the sky down. It was scaled to human height in such a manner that it did not dwarf man, but stood as a setting that made his figure the only absolute, the gauge of perfection by which all dimensions were to be judged. When a man entered this temple, he would feel space molded around him, for him, as if it had waited for his entrance, to be completed.
Also, it’s a book about a maverick designer obsessed with quality, and it’s scathing toward the mediocrity of big business. It’s like Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance that way.
nnggghh.. I dunno Manish. It’s stupid of me to get into a conversation about The Fountainhead when I haven’t read it…but I guess now’s the time to clear up some of the reasons why I stayed away. (of course I should’ve just read it and found out for myself, but that would have been the sensible, direct thing to do.)
My assumptions about the book were pretty close to what MP describes. And reading the quotes you’ve posted, just reaffirms every one. I see a line like it did not dwarf man, but stood as a setting that made his figure the only absolute, the gauge of perfection by which all dimensions were to be judged as the ultimate glorification of man (humans, womyn, whatever) since he is the “absolute”….a reaffirmation of Neitzchean ideal, no? Man as deity, uber-man, the gauge of perfection by which all dimensions were to be judged.
withdraws so people who’ve actually read the book can discuss
We all have met Ayn Rand fans – Desi and non-Desi. The glaring thing is that both of them admire her for different reasons. Maybe, i am just ill-informed. Some of the non-Desi tend to Ayn Rand fan to be youthful, contrarian, “i do not owe anything to anyone”. I hearing from desi folks here a different vibe.
To each its own. Maybe, like Wagner (not exactly). Am not a Ayn Rand fan.
From Wikipedia: ” Rand and Objectivism are virtually unknown outside North America, though there are pockets of interest here and there, and her novels are reported to be very popular in India ([7]). Her work has had little effect on academic philosophy, even in North America, for her followers are mostly (with some notable exceptions) drawn from the non-academic world. “
I read “Atlas Shrugged” when I was 20 and had mononucleosis and there was no other book within reach of my bed. For the first 300 pages or so, I figured Rand was setting up these horrible characters to put them through a meaningful character transformation and have them emerge wise or likeable or having souls by the end. By page 500 I realized she actually considered her characters heroic, and expected the reader to as well.
It’s an awful book. Rand was a nut, which would be forgiveable if she wrote well, but she was a terrible writer too. She goes on and on and on and…yawn…on making her specious arguments. Like “objectivism” – as if the huaman animal can, through its fleshy sense organs, ever be truly objective. Rand is about as un-objective as one can be. I even felt a little embarassed for her, reading that book, it was so badly writted, ill-thought-out, and lame.
There are so many Rand-fans on the ‘net (Usenet especially), just do some Google searches to find pro/anti Rand arguments ad nauseum. They go on and on and they’re always the same. People either love her or hate her, and never the twain shall meet.
Written, badly-WRITTEN. Please forgive my typos.
Manish, for once I totally and wholeheartedly agree with you! I think, too often, modern or new becomes confused with the skyscraper (although I love the skyscraper, I love the ultimate Art Deco showpiece; the Chrysler building may be old hat to all of you, but I think there is still some magic in it).
One of the reasons I aesthetically dislike Boston, and prefer Chicago, is the lack of fear of the architects. Bostonians are trapped by their history such that if they do build something new, it’s hideous and concrete bound, as if to confirm the city’s suspicions that modern is anathema. How could you tear down tons of brick houses and put up that horrible concrete government center?
But Chicago. Maybe because of the fire, you see this new city, the ‘bean’ skyscrapers in all different shapes and sizes, but with the space of the Midwest in the streets. And I think these designers have got the right idea. Why can’t India be modern? The future matters most.
Obviously, there should be a comma between the bean and skyscraper……good old desi designed bean.
cicatrix, I know you know this (talking yourself into circles 🙂 ) but the skyscraper and the Chrysler building are art decos expression of the modern; it was a celebration of just such an ethos. To the future…..
Yep, it’s humanist / übermensch, which as an entrepreneur and contrarian I utterly, deeply dig. No, it’s not about skyscrapers, though you could express it that way, contrary to the Roark the protagonist.
The prose is often turgid– Soviet, not Russian 😉 But most of the ideas rock.
Oh, they undoubtedly are. This gets down to whether you’re determinist or volition-oriented, and it’s likely partly hardwired in your genes. So there’s little point trying to persuade people how to react to these ideas– it’s a litmus test.
Engineers, entrepreneurs, mavericks and libertarians often feel a special affinity.
As MD points out, the Chrysler building was dismissed as an act of hubris when it first came out. How sad to repeat that mistake. How un-mutinous 😉
MD, though I still may be on slippery ground here….don’t you think that art deco strikes a chord because it seems so naive and hopeful? Back when they thought machines would solve all our problems?
I love chicago too. But had you tried walking around downtown in the thick of winter? Those skyscrapers are just perfect for capturing lake shore wind-effects and channeling them inland. It’s exactly like being in a wind-tunnel.
Look, I’m not against skyscrapers, modernism, or intelligent design (architecture Imean, not evolution). I think that building in the post could use a few more window too, frankly. It’s just that we’re rushed towards embracing every sort of technology, which is being generated at an ever increasing pace…and I’d just caution that maybe we need to consider repercussions a bit more carefully.
au contraire, mon frere. That’s a pretty self-satisfied way of describing how one would read Rand 🙂 Determinist or volition-oriented? Being dislinclined to take myself seriously as the lord of my domain does not make me a determinist. Humility is a choice too. And I dare you to be more contrarian than that 🙂
Also.. the ubermensch is humanist. …??
I’m with Nina and Cicatrix here. I couldn’t read any of her books myself.
But tech runs at its own pace, and history won’t slow down for us either.
No, but the reverse is true– volitionists do believe in their power to shape their environment.
It’s orthogonal.
Yeah, IMO.
Many early doctrines calling themselves “humanist” were based on Protagoras’ famous claim that “man is the measure of all things…” Religious humanism… tends to concentrate on the dignity and nobility of human achievement and possibility… Secular humanism… acknowledges an individual’s dignity and worth and capacity for self-realization through reason and logic.
The Fountainhead is a lighter read than the ponderous Atlas Shrugged, but I read all 1,100 pages in three days. Captivating stuff.
Libertarian engineer begs to differ.
I read the Fountainhead, and I could not bear to read any other of her books. Selfishness as a virtue is really not the core ethic of any economy — not even a free-market capitalistic one. That is the reason Libertarians choose to believe in Government which is not an institution you can opt out of.
But suddenly when you call it ‘the invisible hand of self-interest,’ it’s Mom and apple pie. Look, that’s the precise part of the books I wasn’t thrilled about, the bit about charitable donations encouraging looters. Hogwash. But the rest rocks.
Yeah, Adam Smith is my bestest favouritest author too 🙂
Glad we are on the same page.
My crib was with the stereotyping. I thought as a non-Objectivist Libertarian engineer I needed to holla. Done.
Now I hear real some Ayn Rand fans….their obscure, intellectual, true producers, me-everything word play. Spend few weeks in the jungle and you will notice that living species do not survive on selfishess…just see how lions, elephants, baboons, jackasls, etc livw.
I will use an example of African Wild Dogs. African Wild Dogs are one of the most ruthless, pack hunters and yet they are very altruistic in the way they share their food, and their markings. Refer http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/African_Hunting_Dog
I spent two weeks in Okavango Delta, Botswana and it is very humbling. Ayn Rand wanted to more “American” than Americans were at her time, therefore all the heroics.
Dawkins would argue that much seeming altruism (and almost all of it in animals) is the selfishness of genes maximizing their chances of propagation.
Sure, self-preservation. I was being devil’s advocate. I have some very close friends who are belivers in Ayn Rand’s way of life. I think they are bold, enterprising people but blind workship, no. Just read this……..I read this in January and didn’t like it.
Ayn Rand Institute: U.S. Should Not Help Tsunami Victims Ayn Rand Institute ^ | 12/30/04 | David Holcbhttp://www.freerepublic.com/focus/news/1311710/posts?page=262erg
Exactly Kush/Manish, the problem with Objectivism is that it confuses lassiez-faire capitalism with mean-spirited anti-altruism.
This is a perfect example of why Objectivism is a pernicious philosophical system.
If the US did not offer tsunami-aid, the US would have to suffer a terrible PR fiasco. Add to that the effect on Asian/Asian-American employee morale across the country. Then the Asian central banks might have to start using reserves to pay for the restoration themselves, which would definitely create a glut and further devalue the dollar.
Markets would suffer, investment would be affected.
Therefore it is actually well meaning free-market motives that persuaded the US to contribute to the aid in the tsunami-hit areas.
Acting like a crabby tight-wad is not part of the free-market credo.
Compare the time and labour to benifit ratios involved in building the havelis of Jaislamer compared to the pre-fab DDA flats built with modern architectual techinques.
The havelis are only ‘sustainable’ if you are a Raja with legions of servants and slaves at your disposal.
I do agree with you about banal architecture, from what I have seen, Indian tastes in modern architecture (also in movies) tend to be ‘tacky’.
The NYT puts a post-modernist spin on the development of the IT park using ‘Indian methods’ (as indian as a ciggerette factory built during colonialism gets).
The trouble is modernism has not yet fully penetrated India and most people live in ‘traditional’ housing out of neccessity not choice.
As for objectivism…
I can see Ayn Rand’s influence at work already.