"My Architect", Kahn and Khan
22 January 2004, 18:00 PM
By
Jewel, Khulna University, Khulna
22 January 2004, 18:00 PM
DS articles 'Philadelphia and Dhaka' of 19/11/03 and 'Finding Dhaka in New York' of 24/11/03 both based on a documentary 'My Architect' by Nathaniel Kahn are quite emotionally charged. For the writers it was reflective patriotism that prompted them to write and for Nathaniel it is the eternal feeling of attachment that a son has for his father that found an expression in his documentary. So far it is understandable but when you dig a bit deeper you find two dubious characters in Luis I Kahn, the architect of Shere-e-Bangla Nagar and Ayub Khan who conceived Shere-e-Bangla Nagar to deceive Bengalis. Both Kahn and Khan had their own agenda while creating Shere-e-Bangla Nagar and it has nothing to do with the 'nation's dream of democracy'. Kahn created (may be) a master piece in Dhaka at a huge cost of tax payers money, that he could not create, as Nathaniel says, in Philadelphia and Khan tried to pacify and distract the people while siphoning its wealth for the creation of Islamabad. Kahn and Khan had their own perceived view of the people which not necessarily reflected their aspirations. Nathaniel and Bangladesh had one thing in common, the son knows how he was deprived by his father Louis Kahn and the people of Bangladesh know how they were deprived by Ayub Khan. Yet we tend to admire and eulogise the father and his creation based on deceptions.Let us call a spade a spade; as a nation we need not be so emotional.
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