Charles Correa’s ideas and practice with reference to current discourse in

architecture and urbanism.

We live in a world of images today. There is a multiplicity of images, but a dearth of meaning. A
senseless fatigue has set in. Within the confines of a capitalist society, conceptual basis of
architectural work remains largely redundant or arbitrary. The importance of the non-manifest and
the potency of mythic beliefs, so central of Correa’s ideology have thus become all the more
pertinent. I distinctly recollect the feeling of extending into the Other while traversing through
Bharat Bhavan or the Gandhi Memorial Museum. His works have the capacity to ignite the imaginal
realm in one’s mind, making the invisible visible. His ideas regarding a deep structure wherein every
creative individual must dive and derive their own images provide a direction as to how one may
function; and ‘create’ while enduring this overwhelming bombardment of images.

He’s works bely a frugality that speaks of more, a subtraction which creates a concentrate of richer
complexity. Forms are whittled down to precise expression and then repeated in a structured
narrative. We sense a cut.

We can identify common ideological roots in his work; an emphasis on creative order and visual
language, a concern for climate and social issues, a response to individual-collective relationships at
various scales. The sort of versatility and curiosity that can bring out both Kanchanjanga Apartments
and Belapur Incremental Housing, the IUCAA campus and Jawahar Kala Kendra; are crucial for
practicing within the plurality of our country without falling prey to stylistic mannerisms.

I have forgotten what the open skies look like. All I know is the glaring sun and some mal-nourished
clouds slightly visible in the narrow margins between two skyscrapers. Older low storey structures
are being redeveloped into multi-storeyed concrete blocks. Every plan of a new housing construction
scheme looks exactly the same, a grouping of closed rooms. A ‘standing’ balcony is the only interface
between a common urban dweller and the outside world. Correa’s courts have shown us time and
again how voids can be more than mere left-overs, spaces that can lead us to the skies while holding
the built mass together.

Realizing construction as a means of generating mass employment, how transport to places of work
can affect the growth of cities and how housing for the urban poor should be appropriate to their
lifestyles as well as aspirational, all these notions underline Correa’s holistic understanding of the
economy and cultural traditions. His advocacy for employing these knowledge systems to negotiate
balanced, feasible solutions is inspiring to those of us who find one-dimensional answers
inadequate.

Studies show that temperatures in Indian cities will exceed survivable limits by 2050. The
forthcoming paradigm shifts due to technological progress and artificial intelligence will also require
a hard re-set. How to deal with the inevitable, changing contexts, climates, changing beliefs?

Even though the scale of issues may have outrun some of Correa’s specific outlines, learnings from
his concerns and approaches as well as his belief in the potential of our field to conceptualize and
build alternative futures, developed over vast experience with CIDCO and his architectural practice,
remain indispensable to crafting a way forward.