I thought I'd post something on Delhi's tryst with the motor car this week. I have often wondered about the introduction of the motor car (given their ubiquity in Delhi!) and came across newspaper reports of early motor car races around the city after 1903. As I mentioned in my previous post, the Durbar of 1903 was 'the' big occasion for the motor car. Louis Dane, the then Lt. Governor of Punjab showed up in one with great fanfare. It seems though that just after this, motor car races (motor car trials, as they were called) had begun across the country and Delhi was on some sort of grid for people testing these new forms of transport.
Now, on the one hand, the car was a way of conquering the Indian landscape, this argument is valid. I have a picture here from the 1920s where you can see the juxtaposition of the 'old' and 'new.' The new car in the foreground and the 'old' Jama Masjid (the main congregational mosque in Delhi) in background. The photograph is a way of capturing that powerful contrast and imprinting this form of technological (and colonial) dominance on the onlooker.
However, from what I've read in the newspaper reports, it seems that Indians were also involved in driving/racing motor car races at an early date. This perhaps contradicts the point that this was an exclusively European or imperial venture. Specifically speaking, Indian princes were keen on racing cars and were involved in these races around Delhi. So, overall, it's a bit complicated.
Anyway, the car also becomes a subversive medium of transport technology for the colonial government. There was a growing uptake of cars over time. I came across a newspaper report on the growth of 'gambling dens' in Delhi's motor cars in 1931. This was paranoia around the popularity of cars and the threat they posed to the colonial government- you couldn't always see what was behind these mobile doors, it would seem.
Well, I will post something more on cars in due course. Watch this space.
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