The Indo-Saracenic Revival (also known as Indo-Gothic, Mughal-Gothic, Neo-Mughal, Hindoo or Hindu-Gothic) was an architectural style movement by British architects in the late 19th century in British India. It drew elements from native Indo-Islamic and Indian architecture, and combined it with the Gothic revival and Neo-Classical styles favoured in Victorian Britain. The style gained momentum in the west with the publication of the various views of India by William Hodges and the Daniell duo, (William Daniell and his uncle Thomas Daniell) from about 1795. Saracenic was a term used by the ancient Romans to refer to a people who lived in desert areas in and around the Roman province of Arabia, and who were distinguished from Arabs.^[1]

Background[link]

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Indo-Saracenic[link]

Confluence of different architectural styles had been attempted before during the mainly Turkic, Delhi Sultanate and Mughal periods. Turkic and Mughal conquest in the Indian subcontinent, introduced new concepts in the already rich architecture of India. The prevailing style of architecture was trabeate, employing pillars, beams and lintels. The Turkic invaders brought in the arcuate style of construction, with its arches and beams, which flourished under Mughal patronage and by incorporating elements of Indian architecture, especially Rajasthani Temple architecture

Local influences also lead to different 'orders' of the Indo-Islamic style. After the disintegration of the Turkic Delhi Sultanate, rulers of individual states established their own rule and hence their own architectural styles, which was heavily influenced by local styles. Examples of these are the 'Bengal' and the 'Gujarat' schools. Motifs such as chhajja (A sunshade or eave laid on cantilever brackets fixed into and projecting from the walls), corbel brackets with richly carved pendentive decorations (described as stalactite pedentives), balconies, kiosks or chhatris and minars (tall towers) were characteristic of the Mughal architecture style, which was to become a lasting legacy of the nearly four hundred years of the Mughal rule.

The Mughal Style[link]

Mughal Interiors Racinet, c. 1876

The Mughal style was conceived by Akbar the Great, the third mughal emperor and also the architect of the Mughal empire. This 'Akbari' Style was an amalgam of earlier Timurid, Persian and indigenous Indian styles. This style was further consolidated by his grandson and fellow architecture enthusiast, Shah Jahan. Some of the significant architectural legacies of the Mughals are Humayun's Tomb, the Taj Mahal, the Forts of Agra and Lahore, the city of Fatehpur Sikri, Akbar's Tomb.

Decline and Revival[link]

Shah Jahan was succeeded by his puritanical son, Aurangzeb, who had no soft spot for art and architecture.^[2] As a result, Mughal architecture suffered, with all artisans migrating to work under the patronage of local rulers. With no major architectural projects undertaken, the Mughal style rapidly declined. This decline was evident in buildings such as Bibi Ka Maqbara, built by Azam Shah, son of Aurangzeb. However, local rulers embraced the style, as they had emulated it during the respective reigns of Jahangir and Shah Jahan.^[3] The last architectural marvel produced during this waning period of Mughal rule was Safdarjung's Tomb, mausoleum to the second Nawab of Awadh.

By the early 19th century, the British had made themselves the virtual masters of the Indian Subcontinent. In 1803, their control was further strenghthened with the defeat of the Marathas under Mahadaji Scindia. They legitimized their rule by taking the then weak Mughal Emperor, Shah Alam II under their protection, and ruling through him. However, their power was yet again challenged when in 1857, the Indian soldiers in their employ, together with rebellious princes lashed out in open revolt (which came to be known as the Revolt of 1857). However, this uprising was doomed from the start, and was crushed by the British with ferocity, marking the end of the Mughal Empire.^[4] Soon after, they embarked on deliberate vandalism, by demolishing significant amount of buildings in the Red Fort (the residence of the recently extinct Mughal Empire) and replacing them with towering and unimpressive barracks. It was the first attempt towards erasing the architectural legacy of the Mughals.^[5]

However, to usher in a new era, the British 'Raj', a new architectural tradition had to be founded. Hence they contemplated a marriage between the existing styles of India with imported styles from the West such as Gothic (with its sub styles of French/Irish Gothic, Venetian-Moorish etc.), Neoclassical and Art-Deco, Gothic even more so because their design philosophy was inclined towards grand scale (as is evidenced by buildings such as the Taj hotel). By doing this they kept elements of British and European architecture, while adding Indian characteristics; this, coupled with the British allowing some regional Indian princes to stay in power, made their presence more 'palatable' for the Indians. The British tried to encapsulate South Asia's past within their own buildings and so represent Britain’s Raj as legitimate, while at the same time constructing a modern network of railways, colleges, and law courts.

The Style outside India[link]

The architectural style was exported to British Malaya (present day Peninsular Malaysia) via British engineers and architects influenced by Indo-Saracenic stylings in British India. During the design of a new town hall for Kuala Lumpur in the late 19th century, C. E. Spooner, then State Engineer of the Public Works Department, favoured a "Mahometan style" over a neoclassical one to reflect Islamic mores in the region, instructing architect Charles Norman, who was further assisted by R. A. J. Bidwell, to redesign the building.^[6] Norman and Bidwell, having previously served in northern India, adopted various elements of Indo-Saracenic architecture into the town hall. Upon completion in 1897, the town hall, now known as the Sultan Abdul Samad Building, became the first building influenced by Indo-Saracenic architecture to be built in Malaya.^[6] The town hall inspired other civic buildings in the vicinity to be built in a similar style, while a handful of commercial buildings in Malaya have also been known to adopt some of the style's elements. The style was also favoured as one of several adopted by British architects with regards to Malayan mosques as they did not feel the need to adhere accurately to the cultural heritage, and the traditional culture of the Malays, who remain prominent in Malayan society and are Muslims, did not have the means to design a building of imperial scale; both the Jamek Mosque and Ubudiah Mosque are examples of mosques that resulted from this combination.^[7] While its popularity was limited to the 1890s to the 1910s, the style has been reused for newer governments buildings of the late-20th century and 21st century, such as several public buildings in Putrajaya.

Characteristics[link]

Indo-Saracenic designs were introduced by British imperialist colonizers, promoting their own sense of “rightful self-glorification”, which came to appeal to the aesthetic sensibilities of continental Europeans and Americans, whose architects came to astutely incorporate telling indigenous "Asian Exoticism" elements, whilst implementing their own engineering innovations supporting such elaborate construction, both in India and abroad, evidence for which can be found to this day in public, private and government owned buildings. Public and Government buildings were often rendered on an intentionally grand scale, reflecting and promoting a notion of an unassailable and invincible British Empire.

Again, structures of this design sort, particularly those built in India and England, were built in conformance to advanced British structural engineering standards of the 1800s, which came to include infrastructures composed of iron, steel and poured concrete (the innovation of reinforced cement and pre-cast cement elements, set with iron and/or steel rods, developed much later); the same can be said for like structures built elsewhere, making use of the same design vocabulary, by local architects, that would come to be constructed in continental Europe and the Americas: Indo-Saracenic’s popularity flourished for a span of some 30-years.

Notable, too, is that the British, in fact Europeans generally, had long nurtured a taste for the aesthetic exuberance of such “Asian exoticism” design, as displayed in innovative Indo-Saracenic style and also in their taste for Chinoiserie and Japanned. Supported by the imagination of skilled artisans of various disciplines, exoticism promulgated itself across a broad demographic of British, European and Americas’ citizenry, Adaptation of such design innovations spilled over into and determined the aesthetic direction of major architectural projects, expressing themselves in the Baroque, Regency and design periods beyond.

Today, that spread of elaborate Asian exoticism design fulfillment remains evidenced in many residential and governmental edifices wrought of the masterpiece initiatives of the 16th, 17th and 18th centuries; much had initially been contributed by the stupendously rich and indulgent sea-merchant Venetian Empire, whose existence spanned nearly a millennium, and whose Gothic architecture came to incorporate a plethora of Asian exoticism elements, such as the Moorish Arch in its windows, related to the latter "harem window"

Generally, the insatiable craze for Asian exoticism relished in those earlier periods, testamentary in their parallel Chinoiserie expression, likewise, ushered in this latter colonial British fascination with the luxuriant exoticism found in the indigenous Indian design milieu, whose characteristics includes the following vocabulary list of design elements and motifs (often paralleling and expanding upon the already ornateness of the earlier Venetian’s unique Gothic-Moorish, also known as Venetian Gothic architecture ad-mixture):

• onion (bulbous) domes
• overhanging eaves
• pointed arches, cusped arches, or scalloped arches
• vaulted roofs
• domed kiosks
• many miniature domes
• domed chhatris
• pinnacles
• towers or minarets
• harem windows
• open pavilions or pavilions with Bangala roofs
• pierced open arcading

Chief proponents of this style of architecture were these: Robert Fellowes Chisholm, Charles Mant, Henry Irwin, William Emerson, George Wittet and Frederick Stevens, along with numerous other skilled professionals and artisans throughout Europe and the Americas.

Structures built in Indo-Saracenic style in India and in certain nearby countries were predominately grand public edifices, such as clock towers and courthouses. Likewise, civic as well as municipal and governmental colleges along with town halls counted this style among its top-ranked and most-prized structures to this day; ironically, in Britain itself, for example, King George IV's Royal Pavilion at Brighton, (which twice in its lifetime has been threatened with being torn-down, denigrated by some as a “carnival sideshow”, and dismissed by others as “an architectural folly of inferior design”, no less) and elsewhere, these rare and often diminutive (though sometimes, as mentioned, of grand-scale), residential structures that exhibit this colonial style are highly valuable and prized by the communities in which they exist as being somehow “magical” in appearance.

Typically, in India, villages, towns and cites of some means would lavish significant sums on construction of such "indigenous ethnic architecture" when plans were drawn up for construction of the local railway stations, museums and art galleries.

The cost involved in the construction of buildings of this style was high, including all their inherent customization, ornament and minutia decoration, the artisans' ingenuous skills (stone and wood carving, as well as the exquisite lapidary/inlaid work) and usual accessibility to requisite raw materials, hence the style was executed only on buildings of a grand scale. However the occasional residential structure of this sort, (its being built in part or whole with Indo-Saracenic design elements/motifs) did appear quite often, and such buildings have grown ever more valuable and highly prized by local and foreign populations for their exuberant beauty today.

Either evidenced in a property’s primary unit or any of its outbuildings, such estate-caliber residential properties lucky enough to boost the presence of an Indo-Saracenic structure, are still to be seen, generally, where in instances urban sprawl has not yet overcome them; often they are to be found in exclusive neighborhoods' (or surrounded, as cherished survivors, by enormous sky-scarpers, in more recently claimed urbanized areas throughout this “techno” driven, socio-economic revolutionary era marking India’s recent decade’s history), and are often locally referred to as "mini-palaces". Usually, their form-factors are these: townhouse, wings and/or porticoes. Additionally, more often seen are the diminutive renditions of the Indo-Saracenic style, built originally for lesser budgets, finding their nonetheless romantic expression in the occasional and serenely beautiful garden pavilion outbuildings, throughout the world; especially, in India … and England.

Examples[link]

In Bangladesh[link]

In India[link]

In Pakistan[link]

In the United Kingdom and Australia[link]

In Malaysia[link]

See also[link]

• Moorish Revival architecture

References[link]

Amitabh Bachchan
Amitabh Bachchan in 2009
Born	Amitabh Harivansh Bachchan (1942-10-11) 11 October 1942 (age 69) Allahabad, United Provinces, British India
Residence	Prateeksha, Mumbai, Maharashtra, India
Occupation	Actor, producer, singer, television presenter
Years active	1969–present
Spouse	Jaya Bhaduri (1973–present)
Children	Abhishek Bachchan Shweta Nanda
Website
bigb.bigadda.com

Amitabh Bachchan ([əmɪtaːbʱ bəttʃən] ( listen), born Amitabh Harivansh Bachchan on 11 October 1942) is an Indian film actor. He first gained popularity in the early 1970s as the "angry young man" of Hindi cinema, and has since appeared in over 180 Indian films in a career spanning more than four decades.^[1][2] Bachchan is regarded as one of the greatest and most influential actors in the history of Indian cinema.^[3][4][5]

Bachchan has won numerous major awards in his career, including three National Film Awards as Best Actor, and fourteen Filmfare Awards. He is the most-nominated performer in any major acting category at Filmfare, with 37 nominations overall. In addition to acting, Bachchan has worked as a playback singer, film producer and television presenter. He also had a stint in politics in the 1980s. He has received both the Padma Shri and the Padma Bhushan civilian awards from the Indian government.

Early life[link]

Bachban was born in Allahabad, Uttar Pradesh. His father, Harivansh Rai Bachchan, was a Hindi poet, and his mother, Teji Bachchan, was a Sikh from Faisalabad (now in Pakistan).^[6] Bachchan was initially named Inquilaab, inspired from the famous phrase Inquilab Zindabad, during the Indian independence struggle. However, at the suggestion of fellow poet Sumitranandan Pant, Harivansh Rai changed the name to Amitabh which means, "the light that would never go off." Though his surname was Shrivastava, his father had adopted the pen-name Bachchan (meaning child-like in colloquial Hindi), under which he published all his works. It is with this last name that Amitabh debuted in films, and, for all public purposes, it has become the surname of all members of his family. Bachchan's father died in 2003, and his mother in 2007.^[7]

Amitabh is the eldest of Harivansh Rai Bachchan's two sons, the second being Ajitabh. His mother had a keen interest in theatre and had been offered a role in a film, but preferred her domestic duties. She had some degree of influence in Bachchan's choice of career because she always insisted that he should take the centre stage.^[8] He attended Allahabad's Jnana Prabodhini and Boys' High School (BHS), followed by Nainital's Sherwood College, where he majored in the art stream.^{[citation needed]} He later went on to study at Kirori Mal College of the University of Delhi and completed a Bachelor of Science degree.^{[citation needed]} In his twenties, Bachchan gave up a job as freight broker for the shipping firm, Bird and Co., based in Calcutta now known as Kolkata, to pursue a career in acting.^{[citation needed]}

Career[link]

Early work: 1969–1972[link]

Bachchan made his film debut in 1969 as a voice narrator in Mrinal Sen's National Award winning film Bhuvan Shome. Thereafter he got his first acting role as one of the seven protagonists in Saat Hindustani, a film directed by Khwaja Ahmad Abbas and featuring Utpal Dutt, Madhu and Jalal Agha. Though the film was not a financial success, Bachchan won his first National Film Award for Best Newcomer.^[9]

Anand (1971) followed, where he starred alongside Rajesh Khanna. Bachchan's role as a doctor with a cynical view of life garned him his first Filmfare Best Supporting Actor Award. He then played his first negative role as an infatuated lover-turned-murderer in Parwaana (1971). This was followed by several films including Reshma Aur Shera (1971). During this time, he made a guest appearance in the film Guddi which starred his future wife Jaya Bhaduri. He narrated part of the film Bawarchi. In 1972, he made an appearance in the road action comedy Bombay to Goa, directed by S. Ramanathan. Many of his films during this early period did not do well, but that was about to change.^[10]

Rise to stardom: 1973–1983[link]

Director Prakash Mehra cast him in the leading role for the film Zanjeer (1973) as Inspector Vijay Khanna. The film was a sharp contrast to the romantically themed films that had generally preceded it and established Amitabh in a new persona—the "angry young man" of Bollywood cinema.^[2] He earned a Filmfare nomination for Best Actor. Filmfare considers this one of the iconic performances of Bollywood history.^[10] The year 1973 was also when he married Jaya, and around this time they appeared in several films together; not only in Zanjeer but in films such as Abhimaan which followed and was released only a month after their marriage. Later, Bachchan played the role of Vikram in the film Namak Haraam, a social drama directed by Hrishikesh Mukherjee and scripted by Biresh Chatterjee addressing themes of friendship. His supporting role won him his second Filmfare Best Supporting Actor Award.^{[citation needed]}

In 1974, Bachchan made several guest appearances in films such as Kunwara Baap and Dost, before playing a supporting role in Roti Kapda Aur Makaan. The film, directed and written by Manoj Kumar, addressed themes of honesty in the face of oppression and financial and emotional hardship. Bachchan then played the leading role in film Majboor, released on 6 December 1974, which was a remake of the Hollywood film Zigzag. The film was only a moderate success at the box office.^[11] In 1975, he starred in a variety of film genres from the comedy Chupke Chupke, the crime drama Faraar to the romantic drama Mili. 1975 was the year when he appeared in two films which are regarded as important in Hindi cinematic history. He starred in the Yash Chopra directed film Deewaar, opposite Shashi Kapoor, Nirupa Roy, and Neetu Singh, which earned him a Filmfare Nomination for Best Actor. The film became a major hit at the box office in 1975, ranking in at number 4.^[12] Indiatimes Movies ranks Deewaar amongst the Top 25 Must See Bollywood Films.^[13] Released on 15 August 1975 was Sholay (meaning flames), which became the highest grossing film of all time in India, earning INR 2,36,45,00,000 equivalent to US$ 60 million, after adjusting for inflation.^[14] Bachchan played the role of Jaidev. In 1999, BBC India declared it the "Film of the Millennium" and like Deewar, has been cited by Indiatimes movies as amongst the Top 25 Must See Bollywood Films.^[13] In that same year, the judges of the 50th annual Filmfare Awards awarded it with the special distinction award called Filmfare Best Film of 50 Years.

Bachchan starred in comedies such as Chupke Chupke (1975) and Amar Akbar Anthony (1977) and in films such as Kabhie Kabhie (1976). In 1976, he was once again cast by director Yash Chopra in his second film, Kabhi Kabhie, a romantic tale in which Bachchan starred as a young poet named Amit Malhotra who falls deeply in love with a beautiful young girl named Pooja played by actress Rakhee Gulzar. The film saw him again nominated for the Filmfare Best Actor Award. In 1977, he won his first Filmfare Best Actor Award for his performance in Amar Akbar Anthony where he played the third lead opposite Vinod Khanna and Rishi Kapoor as Anthony Gonsalves. In 1978 he starred in all four of the highest grossing films of India in that year.^[15] He once again resumed double roles in films such as Kasme Vaade as Amit and Shankar and Don playing the characters of Don, a leader of an underworld gang and his look alike Vijay. His performance won him his second Filmfare Best Actor Award. He also performed in Trishul and Muqaddar Ka Sikandar which both earned him further Filmfare Best Actor nominations. He was billed a "one-man industry" by the French director François Truffaut.^[16]

In 1979, for the first time, Amitabh was required to use his singing voice for the film Mr. Natwarlal in which he starred alongside Rekha. His performance in the film saw him nominated for both the Filmfare Best Actor Award and the Filmfare Best Male Playback Awards. In 1979, he also received Best Actor nomination for Kaala Patthar (1979) and then went on to be nominated again in 1980 for the Raj Khosla directed film Dostana, in which he starred opposite Shatrughan Sinha and Zeenat Aman. Dostana proved to be the top grossing film of 1980.^[17] In 1981, he starred in Yash Chopra's melodrama film Silsila, where he starred alongside his wife Jaya and rumoured lover Rekha. Other films of this period include Ram Balram (1980), Shaan (1980), Lawaaris (1981), and Shakti (1982) which pitted him against legendary actor Dilip Kumar.^[18]

[edit] 1982 injury while filming Coolie

On 26 July 1982, while filming Coolie in the University Campus in Bangalore, Bachchan suffered a near fatal intestinal injury during the filming of a fight scene with co-actor Puneet Issar.^[19] Bachchan was performing his own stunts in the film and one scene required him to fall onto a table and then on the ground. However as he jumped towards the table, the corner of the table struck his abdomen, resulting in a splenic rupture from which he lost a significant amount of blood. He required an emergency splenectomy and remained critically ill in hospital for many months, at times close to death. The public response included prayers in temples and offers to sacrifice limbs to save him, while later, there were long queues of well-wishing fans outside the hospital where he was recuperating.^[20] Nevertheless, he spent many months recovering and resumed filming later that year after a long period of recuperation. The film was released in 1983, and partly due to the huge publicity of Bachchan's accident, the film was a box office success.^[21]

The director, Manmohan Desai, altered the ending of Coolie after Bachchan's accident. Bachchan's character was originally intended to have been killed off but after the change of script, the character lived in the end. It would have been inappropriate, said Desai, for the man who had just fended off death in real life to be killed on screen. Also, in the released film the footage of the fight scene is frozen at the critical moment, and a caption appears onscreen marking this as the instant of the actor's injury and the ensuing publicity of the accident.^[20]

Later, he was diagnosed with Myasthenia gravis. His illness made him feel weak both mentally and physically and he decided to quit films and venture into politics. At this time he became pessimistic, expressing concern with how a new film would be received and stated before every release, "Yeh film to flop hogi!" ("This film will flop").^[22]

Politics: 1984–87[link]