Dutch Anthropologist Flays `Whitewash Of Part Of History'
Dutch anthropologist Hub Van Wersch(67) finds something very wrong with the white paint coating the lone chimney sticking out of Phoenix Mills in Lower Parel, one of Mumbai's trendiest shopping arcades.
The paint makes the chimney look more a part of the shopping mall and less like a remnant of Mumbai's mill land. “It's like whitewashing a part of your history . It is very insulting to people who once worked for the mills. Central Mumbai was once the industrial heart of the city . The heart has been taken out and replaced by an endless supply of highrises and shopping malls. There's nothing to remind us that Mumbai's wealth was built on the strength of its textile industry ,“ says Van Wersch, who is reminded of the manner in which Netherlands decided to shut its coal mines 50 years ago. “ All mines were rapidly closed and chimneys torn down. This is not the right way to handle history ,“ says Van Wersch.
He has more than a passing interest in Mumbai's history. He has chronicled the city's industrial hub as it transitioned from mills to malls. In 1985, three years after the historic mill workers' strike, the longest in world history , Van Wersch shared a cramped kholi in a Prabhadevi chawl with nine mill workers.
He studied Marathi for six months before living with them. The little Marathi he learnt helped him build a rapport with the mill workers and got them to trust the foreigner in their midst.
“It took a few days for them to get used to having me around. I, too, had to adjust to sleeping shoulder-to-shoulder with so many people in the narrow space in the April heat,“ says Van Wersch.It was only after living with mill workers that he discovered how they managed to dress as neatly as they did in those dismal days after the strike, despite living in cramped quarters. “They all had two shirts. Each day, they wore one while the other was being washed. Dressing well gave them a sense of self-respect,“ he said. He discovered how important it was for them to spend a few rupees on chai each morning, even if that was all they spent on that day .
He got to study khanawal or `eating rooms' where mill workers got home-cooked meals for a fee. “These were organized along regional lines.Maharashtrians went to one khanawal, Gujaratis to another. Groups were formed among people who came from the same area, spoke the same language and enjoyed the same food,“ he adds. Van Wersch was in Pune researching labour at multinationals, during Mumbai's textile strike in 1982. He squeezed in time to visit Mumbai. “I was fascinated that such an enormous strike was taking place under my nose. While I could not spare much time in the city , I knew I would return to write about the textile mills,“ he said. After documenting Mumbai's mill land in the 1980s, he is now back in the city , one that he hopes to use as the backdrop for a novel.
He first visited India in 1972, when, at 24, he undertook a land trip from Europe to Asia. He found himself in Pune, fell in love with the daughter of a famous Marathi poet, married her and went back to Netherlands. He has continued to return to India over the last 40 years.
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