Theodore Hope,a British civil servant in the late 1800s,was in love with Gujarat's heritage and even penned a book on Ahmedabads architecture.It is a sad commentary on todays times that the Surat Municipal Corporation is planning to sell as scrap a bridge named after him
The state government may be willing to reduce to rubbish Surat's Heritage Hope Bridge circa 1877, but theman behind the bridge-Theodore Cracraft Hope believed in appreciating and preserving Gujarat’s ancient architecture.
Hope penned the book ‘Architecture at Ahmedabad :The Capital of Goozerat’in 1866 ,for The Committee of Architectural Antiquities of Western India,under the patronage of Premchand Raichand .Dedicated to the memory of Hon. Alexander Kinloch Forbes, who inspired Hopes and awakened a “ Love for the romantic history and graceful architecture of Goozerat “ in him.
The book is a meticulous labour of historical and descriptive sketch of Gujarat’s dynasties and Ahmedabad's built Heritage structures. Recreated through Theodore’s words that describe the splendour of Jain architecture in Gujarat, as well as the mystic of Ahmedabad’s various Mosques with their unique mode of natural lighting; all of which, are stunningly captured within the camera of Colonel Biggs.
Hope was besotted by the tracery and niches found in Ahmedabad’s ancient architecture and describing both, the Hindu-Muslim forms of design ,he has written ,” Generally these were drawn with a free hand, and at the same time they form the most beautiful details, taken singly, to be found in Ahmedabad. All are different, not only in detail but often in character, but all are beautiful.”
Theodore considered the stone windows of Sidi Saiyed Jaalis as unsurpassed universally and has described them thus,”As examples of this class, they are perhaps unrivalled even in India. At Agra and Delhi there are some nearly as fine, but neither so extensive nor so exquisitely balanced as these. There is something wonderfully beautiful in the mode in which construction is, in these examples, combined with mere ornamentation. It is probably more like a work of nature than any other architectural detail that has yet been designed even by the best architects of Greece or the Middle Ages.”
Hope’s effort to spread awareness about the state’s history and built heritage wealth via this book has found shelf space worldwide; not only in the British Library but also at Harvard University Library and other prestigious educational institutions around the world, where historians, scholars, students of architecture and fine arts refer to it for sourcing information about Gujarat’s glorious past.
Theodore spoke five European languages when he first joined the Bombay Civil Service in 1853. Within two years, he was appointed as Inspector for Gujarat’s then newly formed Education Department. His ‘Hope Vachanmala’ (Hope’s Readers) ,a set of well known text books were prepared for use in basic schooling, translated by local scholars and found instant popularity. In his book ’ Literary Cultures in History’, author Sheldon Pollock has stated how Navalram Pandya ,a pioneering critic, found many similarities between Hope’s style of writing to that of our own great poet Narmad Shankar Dave’s in ‘Narmadgaya’. Pandya observed that,” Both their narratives were simple, native and mature and were equally loved by the educated and uneducated, unlike other pompous Sanskritized Gujarati.”
The energetic collector of Surat, Sir Theodore Cracraft Hope was among the finest of the colonial gentry and in his service of 34 years in India; he spent eight years at Surat, enhancing the city’s civic amenities. He was a favourite among locals not only because he was a model of administrative efficiency but because he heard the petitions every evening himself and chatted freely with the Surtis to sort out their issues.
During Surat's most extensive period of reform, as collector of Surat and head of its municipality, Hope reported to his seniors,"Municipal government can never be a popular government in the sense that it is liked by the people because the very reason de'etre of the Municipality is a perpetual war with those problems which are normal with the mass of the population, and are either followed or looked on with favour by too many upper classes." states Douglas E Haynes in his book ,’Rhetoric and Ritual in Colonial India.’
Today, Surat’s Hope Bridge, hopes for a little understanding of its priceless value by its Municipal governing body, as it stands proudly amidst other bridges, as the first amongst its sequels.
http://lite.epaper.timesofindia.com/mobile.aspx?article=yes&pageid=4&edlabel=TOIA&mydateHid=11-09-2011&pubname=&edname=&articleid=Ar00400&format=&publabel=TOI
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