Another India

It has been a short six years since I first visited India. Yet the pace of change in most of the major cities of this nation is nothing short of astounding. My earlier post on Gurgaon -- a test-case in unbridled globalization -- represents that increasingly globally integrated, English-speaking, wealthier India. That world comprises tens or perhaps a couple of hundreds of millions of others who are some how caught up in a world that increasingly includes cars, shopping markets and malls, restaurant culture, and the like. It is a very influential part of India. 

But there is another India. It is the India of the many hundreds of millions. It disappears only in those most elite gated enclaves of the wealthy in the biggest cities. Elsewhere, it is woven continually into the ever-changing fabric of this nation. It is the barefoot sixteen-year old carrying a ton of grain in bags on the back of a bicycle cart, weaving amidst the traffic of a major city or on a busy highway. It is the hardened migrant laborer from Bihar or Uttar Pradesh sipping a cup of tea from a flimsy plastic cup beneath a tree with coworkers after a long day's work. It is the sprawling slums where even a cursory glance reveals things that are truly hard to see. 

Few places raise more questions for me about justice, politics, and economics than India. Simple solutions just don't fit.

Streets of the old city of Ahmedabad

But there's another more subtle and more beautiful divide in India as well. It is the divide between the "old India" and the "new India." This is, no doubt, a hopelessly simplistic device employed by an inexperienced foreigner. The city of Amritsar was for me quintessentially "old India," an India that I have seen in numerous places, but rarely on the scale of a whole city of 1.5M. I can only describe it as about a billion moving pieces and parts that all appear ready to fall in upon one another at any moment. But they do not. They just keep moving, flowing, pulsing. Like many North Indian cities, Amritsar's old city is surrounded by the remains of a city wall, with numerous gates issuing in various directions. Within the old city (and to some extent throughout it) streets are narrow lanes shadowed by ancient 3-4 story buildings, many in a state of seemingly continual ruin and rebirth. The streets flow with cars, horse carts, tuk-tuks, rickshaws, bicycles, motorbikes, and pedestrians. The goods of thousands of tiny shops spill out into the street and vendors cook every imaginable treat over hot flames and oil. 

One of many varieties of transport in India

The "new India" is the traffic-choked streets and highways of Delhi, Mumbai, and Bangalore, with their new flyovers and freeways. It is the world of overcrowded parking lots in popular restaurant districts, of efficient and timely transportation options. It is the new frontiers of social networking that are everywhere in India. It is the India of "progress." 

The lines between these worlds are not sharp. Elements of the old India that are quaint and beautiful butt up against things that are so unjust as to label them deplorable, if not evil. And then the rickshaw driver's mobile phone rings and the "new India" bursts into the picture. Just as lines between worlds are not sharp, value judgements seem very difficult to make, not just for this outsider, but for Indians themselves. Who doesn't value the economic development of the last 20 years in terms of opportunities it has afforded to middle-class Indians and even the slight boost given to some of the poor? Yet it's hard to avoid simultaneous questions that wonder about the effects of these changes on community, communality, and culture. As is so often the case, such questions are hardly unique to India.

A rural scene in Punjab

The Golden Temple

One of the highlights of this Indian trip was a visit to the Golden Temple in Amritsar. 

The Golden Temple is the center of the Sikh religion that is dominant in parts of the Punjab. There are about 26 million Sikhs living worldwide. One of the most readily identifiable markers of a Sikh is the turban worn by most Sikh men. Sikh rulers once controlled a large part of what is now northwest India and Pakistan before their Empire was defeated by the British in the mid-19th century. 

The Golden Temple surrounded by the "tank"

Today, the Golden Temple is to a Sikh what the Vatican is to Catholics and Mecca is to Muslims. Sikhs come from all over India and from large Sikh communities in America, Canada, and Europe to venerate the Sikh holy books that are in the Golden Temple. I read and heard in several places that it is not unusual for 100,000 people to visit the shrine on a given day. I find it believable, given my experience. 

A man taking a ritual dip in the holy tank

One begins the visit by storing your shoes in a massive and well-coordinated shoe-storage warehouse. You then trek through market stalls toward the entrance to the temple. Along the way, Both men and women are expected to cover their hair and enter the temple with completely bare feet. As you enter, you are asked by large Sikh guards in resplendent regalia and holding spears to wash your feet in a narrow stream. You then descend steps into the courtyard of the Temple itself. It is a huge affair, at least the size of a football field. The Temple sits in the middle, surrounded by a large tank of water that reflects the golden cupolas. Sikh men bathe in the tank, while Sikh women go to a special covered section for ladies. The faithful line up to enter the Temple itself and venerate the sacred Granth, or holy books. The words of the holy book are sung continuously, with words displayed in both Punjabi and English on giant screens in the corners. 

Crowded streets outside the temple

One of the striking things about visiting the Temple is the openness of it. While certain regulations are clearly enforced by spear-wielding Sikhs, the general atmosphere is one of relaxation and sharing the beauty of the place, Sikh or not. A free meal is always available to anyone who comes, and I'm told tens of thousands are fed daily. This openness allows for appreciation of the architecture and beauty of the place, another study in the complexity that is religion in India and South Asia. 

The Grand Trunk Road

I spent a good part of the day today on the Grand Trunk Road, traveling between Chandigarh and Amritsar in the Indian state of Punjab. 

Map of the Grand Trunk Road (from Wikipedia)

The Grand Trunk Road is an ancient highway, stretching from Kabul, Afghanistan over the Khyber Pass into Pakistan and then down through North India and Bangladesh to the port city of Chittagong. Overall, the road stretches 2,500 kilometers or 1,600 miles. The route we took today is a particularly interesting piece of the "GT Road," connecting Ludhiana and Amritsar in the far northwest of India. This was once a part of the busy highway connecting Delhi and Lahore, the capital city of the Raj Province of Punjab before the Partitions of 1947. The border crossing at Wagah now divides what was once a united province. Northbound traffic leaving Amritsar appears to be quite light. Lahore is so very close, yet at the same time so very far away. 

The Lahori Gate, Amritsar

The GT Road ranges from modern four-lane freeway to two-lane highway. Buses, cars, trucks, tractors, bicycle carts, and every other imaginable form of transportation jockeys for position continuously. Our bus seemed to be honking its horn more than it wasn't. It's an elaborate dance whose steps I have most certainly not learned.

Sunset over a river along the way