Why vastu rules in the information age?

Homebuyers in India are depending on vastu like never before for their home buying and renovation decisions

Over the years, as an editor of a magazine as well as digital platforms on interior design, and as an occult agnostic, there was one truth (and stories) I tried very hard to run away from. That vastu is the silent, unhailed force d’être for a majority of those in the design and real estate industries in India. Today, I reluctantly acknowledge the vastu phenomenon. We Indians fear it; we love it. It supports and comforts us.

A first-of-its-kind study conducted by Mahindra Lifespace Developers Limited in 2020 quantified something that everyone seemed to know—that vastu is increasingly becoming one of the most prominent influencing factors for Indians while buying a home. This is alarmingly more so in regions of southern India. According to the study, 82 per cent of the respondents in the city of Hyderabad—including IT professionals and millennials—considered vastu as a primary factor driving their purchasing decisions.

I think the study underestimates popularity figures. Says Kanhai Gandhi, principal architect at multi-disciplinary firm KNS Architects that designs hotels, residential high-rises, HNI homes and large commercial spaces, “Look around you. Vastu is everywhere, from upcoming developments to built spaces. People are very focussed on it now—down to the mattress size.” He says that almost 90 per cent of his business now comes with a mandate for vastu incorporated within the design. “I can guarantee that if not at the start of the project then at a later stage, the lack of vastu is likely to become an issue, which is why I insist on a vastu consultant right at the beginning to avoid redesigning after the plans have been finalised.”

To question or not to question?

Most architects and designers in the country today use vastu in varying degrees. However, only a few question the trend or the science openly. Kayzad Shroff, principal architect at SHROFFLEoN, and architect to media industry heavyweights like Sam Balsara, is a self-confessed skeptic. “I was living in my own bubble until I started practising architecture in Mumbai and realised the ground reality.” He has to reluctantly work with vastu “because one can’t escape it.” Shroff says it’s not the home-owners with ₹5-10 crore properties that are very concerned with vastu. It’s homes worth ₹20 crores and upwards that are. “At that level, it’s no longer about maximising on the positives of a space,” he says.

Mumbai-based Neeta Sinha, astroarchitect and vastu consultant to numerous Bollywood actors like Amitabh Bachchan, Akshay Kumar and Hrithik Roshan, as well as top corporate honchos, says, “Vastu has become a craze.” People have started using it not only for home design concerns but also for problems in marriages, childbirth and so on. “Earlier, very few interior designers and architects knew about or used vastu. Now many have learned the principles themselves. Though the science of vastu is very vast, it can be summarised in 40-45 rules. It is then very easy for interior designers to pick it up and interpret it in their own designs. It should not be used as a toy.” She says home-owners need to be more discerning of credentials when hiring vastu consultants.

Since the interiors and construction industry in the country is so fragmented, it is hard to put a number to how much money moves because of vastu services. But look around you, read the marketing materials for upcoming high-rises, and that will give you a clue. If you are in a big city, most new constructions you see around are vastu-approved, and second- and third-tier cities are not very far behind.

For a belief system that has integrated so surreptitiously yet so seamlessly into our home designs, and for a ‘science’ that has not yet been officially recognised as an architectural discipline, it did raise a few eyebrows when vastu was inducted as a stream of study at IIT Khargpur in 2017, and more recently reaffirmed by top architects as being “not a superstition but a science” at an event organised by the IIID (Institute of Indian Interior Designers).

Tracing the roots

Let’s look at the practice of vastu and how it came about. Vastushastra was written between 6000-3000 BC during the Vedic period when there was no electricity, no architects and no high-rises to block the sunlight and the wind. It was conceptualised so that a home’s layout could maximise the best of the natural elements. “It’s all about the movement of the sun. Back then, you could not afford to not have the gate in the north-east because that’s where the sunlight comes first. The light remains in the north-west unil sunset so the whole house was designed between these two directions. Vastu was taught in a religious manner because the scholars at that time knew how to cleverly instill it,” says Sinha.

Looming fears

Vastu, like Feng Shui, claims to provide solutions to the ‘sick building syndrome,’ among many other ills. Both say that the five elements that make up the human body, along with the building and the universe, have a way of interconnecting and affecting each other. But contemporary interpretations of vastu have left many scratching their heads.

It has gotten terribly dubious. From maximising the benefit of light and ventilation, vastu has boldly seeped into elaborately rearranging layouts of already built apartments and homes in the name of balancing energy. Beware! Building a toilet in the east may hamper a child’s growth, not sharing walls with your neighbour’s house is preferable, the kitchen burner has to be placed facing an ideal direction and so on. Shroff remembers a client who “wanted to put copper under the floor to create good vastu.

A substantial increase in wealth and property ownership has fuelled this trend. Sinha says it has become a part and parcel of day-to-day life for many. “People like to share more now; they are more open about their problems and also what brings them relief,” she says. Sinha is considered as a status symbol in many circles. “Everyone likes to show off that they sought advice from a vastu consultant. Except for celebrities, all my clients love to take my name,” she adds. It also helps that socially, there is more acceptance within the younger lot about alternative belief systems and spiritual theories, or considering concepts like the energy of the cosmos and that of spaces.

I believe what is adding fuel to the fire is fear. Some parts of India have become ridiculously wealthy in the past few decades. This unprecedented generation of wealth within a certain strata has brought in anxiety that it could all well be lost. Gandhi sums it up well, “Vastu is popular because people are very insecure of losing their good fortune.”

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