Chandigarh, India's Milton Keynes?

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On the toy train from Kalka to Simla November 25, 2014



...or if I was being very unkind, Basildon! It is the capital of Hayana and the Punjab and has the highest per capita income in India.



It really is unlike any other part of India we have been to. The traffic is orderly, the centre is one long park and on the whole people mostly adopt western dress. Many people speak English.



Chandigarh like Milton Keynes is a new town. In 1947 partition of India and Pakistan split the Punjab in two. The original capital Lahore ended up in Pakistan so Indian Punjab needed a new capital. Their solution was to hire Le Corbusier to design one for them. This was the 50's and the age of concrete. As new towns in England have found the architecture does not wear well. The same is apparent in Chandigarh. The High Court and Capital Complex are now a little sad. The pools in front are dry.



The High Court did have a quaint little free museum and we enjoyed talking to the curator Madivar. He explained about the Indian legal system and the constitution of which there was a copy. It is the longest constitution in the world. Ironic when you think India seems to exist by ignoring almost every rule they have. He explained some of the trials of independence fighters and put them in contemporary context. The pictures showed Le Corbusier and Nehru and the buildings in their original grandeur.



We really enjoyed the gardens. In the centre is a 40 acre Rose Garden with each bed having a different variety. It was amazingly peaceful and many beds were in bloom. There was also a Bougainvillae Garden, not as colourful and fragrant as the Rose Garden and still a nice place to wander.



The weirdest place is Ned Chand's rock garden. Ned Chand started creating it in secret in the sixties making small figures using waste materials from the new city. After 8 years of transforming some waste ground his work was discovered and almost destroyed before the city realised its creativity and attraction. The city then gave Ned Chand a government job and a team of helpers. They have been continuing to expand since and now it has some towering walls, a row of swings hung from arches and waterfalls. The original figures tiled with fragments of cups, toilet bowls, bracelets and electric fittings are still what makes it special.



So Chandigarh is not Basildon. It does have definite similarities with Milton Keynes. Each block, for example, is a numbered sector. They are both from a similar era with too much concrete. Milton Keynes should find space for a Rose Garden.

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Photos

One of the swings at Ned Chand's Rock Garden
Note it is still to be finished