Asian Window

In Mint, Vir Sanghvi, a former Mumbai resident, reacts to watching one of his city’s greatest symbols go up in flames

Sometimes a single image has more impact than a hundred tragic stories. That’s how it was with the sight of the twin towers up in flames—symbols of American achievement reduced to rubble by the actions of a small group of jehadis. And that’s how I felt when I saw the dome of the Taj Mahal hotel blazing brightly in the Bombay night.

That image will stay with me for as long as I live. And I think it is forever etched in the minds of anybody who has ever lived in Bombay or loves this greatest of all Indian cities.

To understand the symbolism of the old Taj is to understand the ethos of Bombay. For three decades now, Bombay has been two different cities. The Bombay of the suburbs (defined as anywhere north of Worli or perhaps Parel) is the Bombay you read about: the Bombay of the film industry, the Bombay of many of the communal riots, the Bombay of the newly prosperous professional class, the Bombay of the new malls and the flashy restaurants, the Bombay of the factories and the Bombay of the new dons whose stories so fascinate novelists and the media.

For more on the burning of this iconic Bombay hotel click here.