Mulk Raj Anand was one of the great Indian modernists who shaped the cultural landscape of India for over three decades since Independence. It would not be untrue to say that few individuals have had so profound an impact both intellectually and culturally on the Indian scene, as Dr. Anand. Involved in progressive nationalisms both in India and abroad, Mulk Raj Anand became particularly influential when he settled in Bombay and along with a group of friends founded MARG (Modern Architectural Research Group), which from 1946 onwards started producing a journal that continues to this day as India’s oldest publication devoted to both the visual and performing arts as well as architecture and urban design. He was particularly encouraged by J.R.D. Tata. Mulk Raj Anand’s career with Marg lasted thirty-five years – during his tenure, he sought to present through the printed medium an encyclopedic museum without walls on the arts of India as well as Asia so that the people of the country could evaluate the cherish their heritage and also make choices about the shape of the future. He also addressed issues such as arts education, museums, urban planning, revivalism, and progressive art. Simultaneously, he spearheaded the progressive modern art movement in India and went on to organize the First Triennale. Always seeking to intertwine ethics, ideas, and pleasure, he made awareness of and engagement with the arts and issues of cultural politics a joyful experience. Marg seeks to honour Dr. Anand’s stellar contributions to the arts and architecture as well as aesthetic and heritage issues of our country. Therefore this volume examines his role as the quintessential post-colonial intellectual who argued for a modern and humanist Indian nation. Most of the volume’s contributors knew Mulk well, as a senior contemporary and as a mentor. The essays in the volume not only recall Dr. Anand’s intellectual development and assess his path-breaking role in making Marg a forum for discussion of wide-ranging cultural issues, but also narrate how his rebellious but compassionate personality touched and transformed lives of individuals as well as cultural institutions and policies. The volume is therefore a fortuitous blend of the intellectual and the emotional, much like Mulk Raj Anand himself.
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