The first three decades after Independence were marked by an extraordinary burst of building. Driven by imperatives of urbanisation, industrialisation, and institution building, Modernist architecture became the idiom of a forward-looking democracy. The promise that Modernist architecture would lead us to a modern world permeated in popular culture. Movies like Hum Hindustani (1960) and Satyakaam (1969) used massive infrastructure and engineering projects to invoke an idea of a modern India that was forward looking and open to new ideas. On the other hand, Arati, the protagonist of Satyajit Ray’s Mahanagar (1963), moves between the traditional domesticity of a middle-class home and the glass partitioned offices of Calcutta with their expansive volumes, natural light, and structural honesty, serving as a visual metaphor for the emancipation of Indian women through modernity’s new freedoms.

Entire cities were planned from this imagination, Chandigarh and Gandhinagar being the best-known examples. Public institutions were reimagined (IIM Ahmedabad, IIT Kanpur, the Hall of Nations in Delhi, among others) and private homes began to reflect a modern way of living. Largely........

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