Nissen huts and Faridabad
In mere appearance of the architecture of Nissen huts, one may not find any sense of heritage, neither monumental or iconic, nor vernacular. Since its creation in 1916, Nissen huts occupied the globe in hundreds of thousands, if not millions. What is then unique about the now-disappeared Nissen huts of Faridabad that qualifies the claim of a lost heritage? It is precisely the practices of people who put these huts to use, since their construction in 1949, that transformed the status of this war-time architecture into an integral part of the social and urban fabric of Faridabad.
The Faridabad in question, to be precise, is the New Industrial Township (NIT) that was built from scratch in the aftermath of Partition to rehabilitate people displaced by the exodus. Under the leadership of Jawaharlal Nehru and Dr Rajendra Prasad, among other eminent nationalist leaders, a development board was constituted in 1949 that was responsible for the planned development of the township. NIT, Faridabad, was conceived to be an exemplary model of development for the newly Independent nation. On the dry and vacant lands, where a bustling city stands today, the board established its office in a Nissen hut, determined to rehabilitate thousands of refugees who were initially housed in tented accommodations at the refugee camps. However, as the monsoon approached, it became evident to the refugees that their tents could not sustain the downpour. They had to resort to a hunger strike that led Nehru to concede to the public pressure and order 250 Nissen huts for the refugees and their children. Hence, the Nissen huts of Faridabad also embodied the memories of solidarity and collective struggle of the refugees.
The history of Nissen huts of Faridabad is profoundly global and local at the same time. Both the huts and refugees shared a history of mobility. Peter Nissen, the designer of Nissen hut, was an engineer. Born in the US in an immigrant Norwegian family, he later migrated to Canada, and then to Europe, ultimately serving in the British army during WW-I. The huts designed by Nissen were built extensively during WW-II, even in British colonies like India. At Faridabad, the huts were supplied by the military, which was initially responsible for managing the refugee camps. Interestingly, the Nissen huts of Faridabad also embodied reminiscence of another important, yet less remembered, actor in the history of Faridabad. These were the British, German and Swiss volunteers working with the Swiss NGO, Service Civil International (SCI), who spent several months in 1950-1951 at Faridabad undertaking construction work. They were invited by Dr Rajendra Prasad at Faridabad to demonstrate the dignity of manual labour and inspire the refugees to construct their own houses, hospitals and school buildings with their own labour. These volunteers also spent several months living in the tents, but as the weather became unfavourable, they too moved to a new address, Nissen Hut no. 131.
For the officials, the construction work done by the refugees was understood as necessary technical training that would ensure their employment in the emergent industries of Faridabad. For this purpose, a polytechnic was also established. This polytechnic, too, was housed in a Nissen hut, but of a special kind. It was realised that the then existing Nissen huts were too narrow to accommodate big machines of the polytechnic. It was thanks to the experimental and pioneering work of Gerber Wolfgang, an SCI volunteer, that a solution was found. Two Nissen huts were combined, without a wall in the middle, to make enough room for a machine hall. The polytechnic was the first building in the industrial area of the NIT and was constructed with the collective labour of European volunteers and refugees.
Thus, at one point in the history of Faridabad, the Nissen huts housed administration and military officials, soldiers, doctors, educators, social workers as well as refugees. They were used as houses, barracks, clinics, factories, and workshops, as offices and schools and as places of worship. This war-time architecture became the tangible tie that brought all these segments together, who were determined to build a new life. The huts defined the materiality of camp life, of refugeehood, of resilience and of creativity. The hut architecture resonated and aligned with the condition of the refugees: they were frugal, yet strong and resilient. Despite being a vital part of the landscapes of refugee rehabilitation, Nissen huts as heritage sites remain ignored. Yet, they are etched in the collective social memory of Faridabad. This is proved by the fact that today, despite their gradual disappearance over the decades, the residential and commercial area near NIT-5 is still called Nissen hut. Many of these supposedly temporary structures survived until the 1990s, and, perhaps even later, and our failure in preserving and restoring even a single such hut forces us to reconsider the idea of what is heritage.
— The writer is a research fellow at University of Oslo
