Having met the Honourable Chairman Capital Development Authority Honourable Capt. Muhammed Usman wish, he had attended this talk on the history of the the making of Islamabad by renowned town planner and architect, Honourable Jehangir Khan, Khan Sherpao organised by Asian Study Group at Khekasha Hall at Serena.
This talk was based on the treasure trove of information that the Red Box contained regarding the history of the country’s capital that the Honourable Karim Yousaf (Romano) , the vintage cars conissuer, transported all the way from England to Pakistan as his love for his country.
Gerard Brigden OBE. This British former fighter pilot turned architect was seconded to Pakistan by the management of the Colombo Plan in 1962. He spent approximately six years supervising the construction of the new capital city, as well as finding time to design some of Islamabad’s first buildings: the Covered Market in G/6, the Polyclinic, the MNA hostel, as well as many of the government residential blocks in sector G/7.
Unfortunately he never got the recognition he deserved from any Pakistani Government entity or department of that time.
In 2006- however- Gerard Brigden was invited to return to Islamabad to an official welcome by the British High Commission and in a splendid ceremony by the Pakistan Institute of Architects, he was presented with the key of the city !
He has left a legacy of buildings and art work that will endure into the future. Now 55 years after he left our shores, through the presentation of original drawings, blueprints, and photographs donated by Gerard’s son, we hope to shed some light on this forgotten hero of Islamabad!
Pakistan became independent and a member of the Commonwealth in 1947, with its capital at Karachi. This city, however, was unsuitable as a long-term capital and the Pakistani government set up a commission in 1958 to select the most suitable site for a new national capital. It chose an area in the north of the country, on the Potohar plateau below the Himalayan foothills and close to Rawalpindi, lying on the historic route from Tehran to Calcutta.
The Greek architect and town planner, CA Doxiadis, who had been an adviser to the commission, was selected in 1959 to prepare the master plan of the city that was to be, in 1960, named as Islamabad. The resultant plan was a grid of principal roads about two kilometres apart that fanned out from an administrative centre south-west towards Rawalpindi.
The diplomatic enclave was planned just to the south-east of the administrative sector and bounded by the Murree Highway and the National Park. Within this area, sites for offices and head of mission residences were to be slightly separated from the residential accommodation of other staff…
We are good at burying our legacy but to bury the builders of the country is unbecoming of any self respecting nation and with this I would humbly request the honourable incumbent Chairman CDA to hang Gérard Brigden portrait right in the main corridor of the Capital Development Authority main corridor as our humble contribution to man who put the first brick that subsequently evolved into what one see today known as Islamabad the capital of Pakistan. .
