DHAKA is 400 years old. The moment we say that, we actually feel the city has seen and experienced a lot. However, unless we say that line and pause simultaneously to remember its 400-year legacy, Dhaka’s glorious past is often lost on us. It is perhaps human nature to take something which is there for granted and to get caught in the urban rat race; we are no different.
   We all know that this city is an old one, but we have heard that line so many times that, to be frank, most of us treat it with indifference. But 400 years means a lot; a lot because the city has history older than many of its western counterparts, which, when Dhaka was a thriving centre of business, commerce, art and entertainment, were barely trying to pick up the rudiments of civilisation. Sadly, we care very little about the city’s past and this indifference is so blatant that when it comes to preserving the heritage of the city, our likely reaction is: oh yes, heritage, you mean the old buildings right?
   Sad is not the right word, but this neglect of the past is truly unfortunate because the present is unavoidably linked to the past and the future will obviously be connected to the present and, this inevitable bond gives the city its unique intrigue. On top of that, it gives the 400 years that we keep on mentioning, a solid ground. In fact, the mention of such a long past has no platform if we have nothing to show for it and no attempts to preserve it.
   Just recently, a walk was staged by Urban Study Group involving well-known social personalities to raise an awareness to preserve the past of the city so that, Dhaka does not get lost under a heap of concrete obsession. Now there is no attempt to demonise the development of the new city where apartments blocks are the main focus because this is also a changing face of the city. We need to keep this as well as the old look of Dhaka to create a mélange, a blend of the old and the new. Regrettably, with the soaring price of land in the city, the target of the people living here is to make profit at the cost of wiping away the past; and that is being done at a ferocious pace with little or no regard for safeguarding the old. But a little more detailed look is necessary. Dhaka has always been categorised between the old and the new and the old part was the place where almost all the buildings and structures of the past were located. But, though these buildings, along with the characteristic cultural rituals of the old part gave that section of the city an inimitable charm, there are very few efforts to preserve these structures.
   Therefore, even buildings, which are barely 100 years old, look like ruins from the late period of the Mughal era. Apart from a few structures like the Lalbagh Fort and the Ahsan Manzil, most structures in the old part of the city are dilapidated. Many of the private houses with intricate carvings and designs of the past are being demolished to make way for apartment blocks and, gradually, the literal strangulation of the identity of that part of town is gathering pace.
   Today, many parts of old Dhaka are like plush new sides of the newer side of town with imposing apartments and large buildings. Another sad thing is that many of the wealthy old Dhaka families are either leaving their homes to come to the new part of town or are breaking down old buildings to make new houses with latest amenities. By nature, man is always attracted towards the new and the latest but when in the west, a carefully well thought-out blend is being carried out between the past and the present, here in Bangladesh, we have made it an art from of getting rid of the old forever. For example, we look at traditional English country houses - restored and kept the way they have been for centuries but with the latest facilities offering the internet, pools, Jacuzzi, home theatre and so on. Of course, one does not have to change something radically to incorporate new items; if there is smart approach then both the past and the present can be made to co-exist together. And, that’s exactly why these English houses along with the preserved castles and palaces in Europe manage to cater to the modernists while piquing their sense of history. Naturally, in a like Bangladesh, having the aforementioned facilities in an old house may sound too much but, we do break down old buildings for newer structures and we do want to incorporate modern facilities. What we do not think is that by preserving the past we can make way for the new and make a very intelligent, not to say, artistic, combination.
   When the city of Dhaka started to expand in the late forties, a lot of the people came to the Dhanmondi area and cleared forest lands to build houses and, by the sixties Dhanmondi became an ideal residential area. However, not even these single unit houses are seen anymore as almost all the houses in the Dhanmondi area have been demolished to make space for rising apartments. Of course, the common argument for this is: people need space and the families that owned a single house have grown bigger and the land owned by them did not increase. But, though we accept this we cannot deny that with the disappearance of the individual houses, a pattern of housing and living of an era will be lost forever.
   Be that as it may, there can be no compromise in the effort to save the heritage of Dhaka city. At least in the case of heritage that belongs, not to a different decade, but to a different century!
   Perhaps, on the grounds of the lack of space we can overlook the disappearance of single unit homes from the new part of the city but under no circumstances can we condone the extermination of the legacy of the city from the old section.
   Recently, there was a civil society move to make the people aware but once a year moves will hardly bring any results. Today, only a handful of people know that Dhaka has 400 years of history and that needs to be saved. But the common person out there or the thousands of people who are migrating to the city need to know that, and understand its core significance.
   Here we are talking about the transformation of the perception of history among the masses. The unvarnished truth: our general sense of history is either ruled by unsubstantiated tales, melodramatic films, where history is distorted at will, or mere conjecture. We, as the people of Dhaka, need to know the city and need to read about its past. A lot of people even do not know the basic historical fact that, Dhaka rose into prominence during the Mughal rule, sank into desolation during the late 19th century and then rose again form the ashes in the 20th century. And, in that roller coaster ride this city has seen lot and the various structures and customs that we know to be truly of Dhaka, have evolved through those ages of rise and fall. Today, as we celebrate 400 years of the city, we need to sit and bring out the glorious past this city has seen and for that, the heritage of the past needs to be saved. This also includes the traditions and the customs. A few years ago, a son-et-lumeire show was held within the premises of the Lalbagh Fort and with special effects, delicious food and the haunting use of light and shadow, the past was re-created for an audience. At that time, quite a few papers wrote that this show must be made into a permanent feature so that the tourist attraction of the old part would multiply. Again, for some odd reason, that did not happen. To stir up the heritage campaign, the Lalbagh Fort can start a light and shadow show on a regular basis and this will pull a lot of people and not just lovers looking for some privacy and an ancient wall to scribble their names on. Automatically, when people are interested in the past, their senses of safeguarding the heritage of the city
will develop.
   In the end, the celebration of 400 years needs to be a collective move and not just an effort by a few. Stamps should be minted, special books should be launched, seminars can be held, TV talk shows involving the new young Dhaka can be arranged and a campaign to make Dhaka a grand mixture of the majestic old and the clinical new can be launched. All the items are there and we have the history. What we need are a few moves and a sense that old does not have to come crushing down. We need to learn, it’s in the old that the seeds of the future lie.