Sriram V reviews Imperial Conversations- Indo-Britons and the Architecture of South India, a book the chronicles the productive interaction between colonial engineers and Indians builders and workers, by Shanti Jayewardene Pillai:

So were buildings such as Senate House purely British? No, argues Shanti Jayewardene Pillai in her book “Imperial Conversations, Indo-Britons and the Architecture of South India”. Basing her work on the construction and subsequent history of four buildings of Madras city, the Chepauk Palace (and the Revenue Board Building), St Andrews Kirk, Pachaiyappas College Building (NSC Bose Road) and the Senate House, she states that all such work were purely collaborative and involved British design interacting with a robust and thriving native engineering. Such collaborations have been termed as Imperial Conversations by the author and she cites several examples in her book to support her claim. These vary from the most commonplace such as the making of bricks to the building of the great edifices of the Raj.

A very interesting post.