India’s Independence Day is, unquestionably, the Prime Minister (PM)’s day. From the very first time — in 1947, when India’s first PM Jawaharlal Nehru unfurled the country’s new national flag from the ramparts of Delhi’s Red Fort — the date has been the PM’s day.

And so it should be. August 15 has also become, by the sheer association of time with space, Red Fort’s day, with the PM, the flag and the fort fluxing into one moment of glory.

And just as Bastille Day, commemorating the Fête de la Fédération right from July 14, 1790, brings the Bastille to France’s life, on India’s Independence Day, Red Fort speaks to us about our past, present, and future.

Inaugurated by the Mughal emperor Shah Jahan (1592-1666) in 1639, it carries on the walls of its Diwan-i-Khas (Hall of Special Audience) a Persian phrase: “Gar firdaus bar rû-e-zamīn ast, hamin asto, hamin asto, hamin ast” (If there be a paradise on Earth, it is here, it is here, it is here). I take the phrase to be about India itself. It is said to have been first used by the Mughal Emperor Jahangir (1569-1627) when he beheld the valley of Kashmir.

The Fort’s full story is not heavenly. Things have happened in Red Fort that could very well turn the phrase on its head: “If there be hell on Earth, it is here, It is here, it is here.”

It was from the Red Fort that Mughal emperor Aurangzeb........

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