Sunil Sethi: Remembering the dead

Much will change for Mumbai's Taj but it will soon acquire the ritual of mourning its dead each year

London: I was coming out of Harrods at lunch time last week when I found barricades set up on a side street and a posse of policemen guarding a large cordoned-off area. Pedestrians and Christmas shoppers were politely being directed to the nearby Underground station and photographers and TV crews had taken up positions. It was a grey blustery afternoon but the chill wind did not seem to deter a group of men and women clutching on to bouquets of flowers and wreaths. A memorial was taking place — quiet, unhurried and sombre — to commemorate a bomb attack on a famous London building.

Twenty five years ago a car bomb planted by the IRA had ripped through the street killing four policemen, three members of the public and injuring nearly 90 people on one of the busiest shopping days of the year. Harrods staff saw the department store’s gilded Christmas show windows blown into the shop and helped carry wounded colleagues and shoppers to safety. One police constable lost both his legs and a part of his hand in the blast.

A small memorial stone of polished granite has been installed on the sidewalk where the terrorist attack occurred and, each year, the dead are remembered in a brief, touching ceremony, organized by London’s metropolitan police in conjunction with Mohd Al Fayed, the owner of Harrods. First, police officers laid wreaths in tribute to their slain colleagues, followed by family members of those killed, then uniformed representatives of Harrods staff and finally Mohd Al Fayed, no stranger to tragedy himself. From a mike near the window displays, a priest delivered a short and mercifully non-denominational address, recounting what happened on December 17, 1983 and reading the names of those killed. And in a last, moving gesture, a lone bagpiper appeared, weaving his way through the gathered crowd at the barricades, the high-pitched wail of his dirge echoing past the tall redbrick buildings.

From start to finish, the ceremony hadn’t taken more than twenty minutes but by the end a substantial crowd had collected, a polyglot mix of tourists, office workers and shoppers, compulsively clicking pictures on cell phone cameras, each taking home images of what has now become a universal collectible—the memory of terrorist violence. Some onlookers were actually crying. For embedded within the imperishable image of Harrods as a world-class emporium of luxury and style is a piece of tragedy. Rather like the Taj in Mumbai which will be remembered for the battle that raged inside, those who died, and the indelible image of its dome on fire.

Apart from the soaring domes that surmount their impressive facades the two buildings have a colourful history in common. The department store in its present architectural shape was completed in 1905, the same year as the Taj. While the Taj was the first hotel in India to instal air-conditioning, Harrods was the first building in London to put in an escalator. It was known as a “moving staircase” and terrified visitors so much that they were offered a glass of brandy at the top to help them overcome the ride. Like the celebrities the Taj has played the host to, Harrods offered credit to the rich and famous including Oscar Wilde, Sigmund Freud, Noel Coward, A A Milne and members of the British royal family. Harrods has nearly as many departments as the Taj has rooms, and 28 restaurants, from champagne bars to tea rooms, pubs and sumptuous food halls that offer haute cuisine of the world. Being the grandest shopping hall in Europe, is visited by up to 300,000 customers on peak days.

After the bomb attack on it 25 years ago it took only a few days for Harrods to return to normal though it may be months before the Taj can put a brave foot forward again. Much will change for India’s most famous hotel on the waterfront in Mumbai but, like Harrods in London, it will soon acquire the ritual of mourning its dead each year.