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Shakuntala Rao recalls how Mumbai’s
Taj Mahal Hotel, was a popular location BE it CID where Dev Anand cheekily follows his love interest on Marine Drive or Rajesh Khanna ambling on Juhu beach in Anand, some places of Mumbai have been immortalised on the celluloid screen. So has been the Taj Mahal Hotel.
I cannot think of Hindi films without thinking of the Taj Hotel, its ornate and imposing century-old structure, the flight of hundreds of pigeons, and the fishing boats dotting the beautiful sea shoreline. Taj has formed the backdrop for many a cinematic stories that have been told on our screens. From the shared mirth of Sanjay Dutt and Arshad Warsi in Lage Raho Munnabhai to the opening scene of Dilip Kumar’s hit Leader to Ashok Kumar’s tonga galloping past its elegant fa`E7ade in the black and white classic Naya Sansar, Taj was there to provide a visual context. As soon as the technology allowed for field production, Mumbai directors took the audiences to the Gateway of India, Victoria Terminal, and Taj Mahal Hotel. Taj Mahal Hotel is to Hindi films what the Empire State building has been to Hollywood. If the Empire State building can list 70 odd films on its website which have prominently featured the building (from classics such as King Kong, Superman, and An Affair to Remember to more modern hits such as Taxi Driver, Independence Day, and Shaft), that number would easily be superseded by the number of films that have featured the Taj Mahal Hotel though the Hotel management has never kept track of its movie appearances. Unlike the images of ‘other’ Mumbai (of gritty, urban realism introduced in films of the 1970s such as Deewar), Taj Mahal Hotel and Gateway of India began to be featured in the romantic films of the 1960s as a location for love, particularly in song sequences, and as a safe space where young urban people could romance. Taj Mahal’s interiors, its restaurants and coffee shops, shopping arcades, beauty parlours, staircases, and swimming pools have been repeatedly used as important locations for romantic interludes. The past few years, Bollywood has abandoned Mumbai, instead, preferring to film overseas cities like London, New York, Cape Town, and Vancouver. Taj Mahal Hotel has been crowded out by the Manhattan skyline, Trafalgar Square, and Sydney Opera House. The destruction of Taj by a handful of rabid gunmen is not merely the destruction of a hotel. It is an attempt to destroy our imagination, what’s beautiful about India’s urban architecture, and the rich history embedded in every corridor of the building. One doesn’t know if Taj Mahal Hotel can ever be returned to its former glory, but this is an urgent call to Mumbai filmmakers: please return to your shores and cast a fresh eye at our own landscapes capturing them for their grandeur.
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