Adity Chakravarti’s labour of love documenting old houses in her blog has finally been “immortalized” in print with the release last week of Reha’ish: At Home in Lucknow. She has done her mite to preserve not only a period of architecture but a disappearing way of life too.
Institutional buildings do not encapsulate personal and familial histories as homes do – so wonderfully captured by Adity – but they do epitomize a time and a sensibility. They bespeak the urges of those powers who guided the destinies of nations, and are thus invaluable too.