LOKESH OHRI
It was the Romans who perfected the science of establishing military camps, something that contributed to their phenomenal success at war. Such was their diligence that written regulations required the digging of ditches and erection of earth walls with well-guarded gates at entry points in each of the four directions, even if the camp was to last only for one night, and set up in friendly territory to boot.
Camps, however, were unstable settlements. To ensure that the sun never set on the empire, British imperialism took a leaf out of the Roman playbook, and passed a law in 1789 in India, laying down regulations for the establishment of cantonments. Cantonments were envisaged as permanent military establishments. To begin with, a medical officer was deputed to suggest sites for such establishments, who promptly declared that cantonments should ideally come up in hill spaces above 6,000 feet, but not exceeding 7,000 feet above mean sea level. Keeping this in mind, many cantonments came up in the hill ranges of India, quite a few eventually metamorphosing into hill stations.
Today, every cantonment is run by a board which is a civic administration body notified under the Cantonments Act, 2006, and functions like a municipal body. While it is under the administrative control of the Ministry of Defence, it can include civilian inhabitants too. A proposal was floated recently, to hand over large parcels of land under cantonments to municipal authorities. Perhaps this is being done to ‘free-up’ land for other uses, reduce the expenditure incurred on cantonment boards and ostensibly ‘undo India’s colonial legacy’. Whatever may be the reason, this move will surely impinge on the heritage value of these picturesque townships that have retained their character even in the face of complete chaos witnessed by us in cities administered by municipal authorities. In the first phase of de-regulation, it is said that in Uttarakhand alone, Dehradun Cantonment will see a transfer of 2,250 acres and Clement Town Cantonment will lose 1,000 acres of land to the municipal authority, the Nagar Nigam.
At this point it is important to clarify that people often confuse cantonments with military stations. Military stations, more than 200 of them in India, are secured areas where armed forces run their own establishments. You can be shot at, no questions asked, if you enter those places without a pass, permit or invitation. Cantonments, 62 in number, are semi-civilian local bodies, much like the municipalities – with regular politics, protests and polls. Of all cantonments, Dehradun is perhaps the most significant, closest to the national capital.
Hill States like Uttarakhand, where the economy depends mainly upon tourism, stand to lose the most if cantonment controls are removed over large parcels of land. One only needs to look at present day Dehradun and Mussoorie to realise what lies in store. While the areas under municipal control here have descended into irreversible urban chaos reflecting uncontrolled carcinogenic growth, the cantonment still shows some semblance of organic growth. Tree-lined avenues and spaces for people to walk and spend leisure time amidst nature attract many a city dweller to the cantonment. In fact, the Doon Valley gives us glimpses of its glorious past as a hill station, where grey hair and green hedges were the hallmarks, only in its cantonment areas. The only reference point on how our cities could have been, remain the cantonments.
Consider the plight of Mussoorie town within its municipal limits, where it is said that if you stand still long enough, chances are someone will build a hotel around you. In contrast, Landour, under the cantonment board has managed to largely limit construction activity to the seventy odd bungalows that dotted the hillsides at the time of independence. It may not be incorrect to say that much of the tourist traffic to Mussoorie is lured in by the possibility of walks one can take through the Deodars, the mountain-scapes and quaint old churches and bungalows that have survived in Landour. The Mussoorie Mall, on the other hand, resembles any crowded and noisy city bazaar during season time.
Many of us would recall the strict regulations in Landour that led to the demolition of a celebrity’s palatial bungalow just because it abutted a defence institution and violated cantonment laws. Not going into the merits of the case, one can safely assume what would have transpired if the bungalow was being built in a municipal area.
Today, cantonment hill towns like Dehradun, Mussoorie, Lansdowne, Ranikhet, have become so a much a part of our folklore and collective conscience that imagining our last refuges as urban sprawls would be painful beyond contemplation. This is especially so because so many of the hill towns have simply given up on any planning and zoning regulations. The State has even resisted the passing of a Heritage Act, therefore offering no protection whatsoever to the heritage structures that have survived the forces exerted by the real estate lobbies.
In fact, the erasure of a colonial legacy through this destructive route should be the last thing on our minds. That we were under the colonial yoke for centuries is a truth that cannot be denied. We must learn from history, not quarrel with it. Our cantonments need to be preserved for what they are, so that coming generations can still experience a lifestyle that once was. To consume everything in the free-for-all of a haphazard march towards ‘progress’ would be like pushing these last remaining islands of peace in the Himalayas.
(Ohri is an anthropologist, author and wanderer based in the Himalayas; views expressed are personal)
