Kinnari Saraiya

Parliament’s Square

Parliament Square Park in London has a statue of Mahatma Gandhi right opposite from the statue of Winston Churchill, both shared an epic rivalry that sealed the fate of the British Empire. Although they were born worlds apart, they both entered the same metaphoric battlefield against each other that would decide the fate of countries and ultimately of the empire. Churchill did whatever was necessary to ensure that India remained British and Mohandas Gandhi, by contrast, dedicated his life to India's liberation, defying death and imprisonment, and create an entirely new kind of political movement: satyagraha, or civil disobedience.

The game of chess was born out of the Indian game called Chaturanga before the 600s AD. Through constant invasions and conquests in an attempt to expand land control, the game of Chaturanga spread to the East and eventually to Europe as chess. The game embodies war & conquests in its play and in its history. The game becomes a dramatic spectacle of the British Empire unfolding through non-violence and violence in the realm of war.