Who needs context?

When the Public Works Department and the various city and town development authorities took to building our skylines in the fifties and sixties, architects and designers (what there were of the species then) complained: "There's no context."

When box-like city skyscrapers mushroomed in the seventies and eighties, agitated design writers (a new breed then) asked: "But where's the context?"

With liberalisation in the nineties, and a sudden rush to go global, it was the turn of the buyers to insist: "Don't lose sight of context." But now, in a new millennium, architect and designer, writer and consumer/user, they all say the same thing: "We don't need a context."

For a generation of design students who associated the lota and the matka as the epitome of Indian design, for architects and home owners for whom ethnic was Indian, the issue of "context" was important.

Not only must a product be Indian, it must also look Indian. (It's another matter that for many years they were "Indian" in still another context, reflecting poor, inefficient designing.)

Therefore, it's interesting that merely years later, the issue of context has simply been erased from all our collective lives.

Part of this comes from a globalisation of culture "" high-earners in large multinationals or from India's knowledge sector who spend their days in glitzy working environments now replicate their lifestyles in Manhattan-style highrises with plate glass and minimal interiors.

They'll readily buy contemporary art (as long as they can afford it) but you're unlikely to have them enthusing over kalamkari wall prints or Madhubani paintings; and they'll settle for steel and glass furniture instead of the faux-Indian look that we'd become used to some years ago.

Then, there's the practicality of global design to consider. How is an "Indian" designer "" as opposed to a "foreign" or even a "Western" designer "" to style, say, a mobile phone differently. A computer will have the same applicability (perhaps with different keyboards) in different countries.

Even a car is intended for a global market, and while small cars might be more practical in India, how do you "Indianise" the design of a car? Yes, a designer may find a way to suspend a phone from the saree, for argument's sake, but there is no way that the keypad or body will need to be any different in different cultures. And since many of the products we utilise today are standardised to global requirements, ultimately utility and function will score over any attempts to contextualise a design.

Purists might argue that with the same technology available democratically across the board, it is design that is the eventual differentiator. True. But it is excellence of design rather than the cultural paradigm of design that will mark that difference.

And I must admit that for some time now I have begun to nurture a sneaking affection for good (rather than Indian) product design, for less fastidious, more minimalistic interiors.

Does context no longer warrant any merit then? In the end, it will count in the small details "" the fabric of your drapes, the accessories on your table, the particularistion of product packaging "" but for the masses, it will hardly matter that the light was made in Italy, the toaster is Chinese or the pair of scissors in your hand Korean.

And for the elite, in any case, the context has never been culture specific but based on personalisation.