market in the pandemic. [Text and photos by Mayank Austen Soofi] Ramzan is gone, not its raunaq. The peppy bunting is hanging upon the street like an expired blessing (see photo). This weekday afternoon Old Delhi’s Matia Mahal Bazar is…
A souvenir of memories. [Text and photos by Mayank Austen Soofi] Loved ones go, the objects of their daily life stay. And some trace of the departed, tidbit of a particular memory perhaps, is evoked by those objects. Like in…
A survivor. [Text and photos by Mayank Austen Soofi] Let’s talk about Delhi’s extinct bookshops. The Bookworm in Connaught Place had a spiral staircase, that went up to the Capital’s best collection of books on cinema. The Fact & Fiction…
The parlour confession. [By Mayank Austen Soofi] Nadia Khan is leaving Delhi. After six years as a research fellow in Jamia Millia Islamia university where she finished her PhD on “expats assigned to India,” the Srinagar native is herself to…
Builders of a new city. [Text and photos by Mayank Austen Soofi] The air is laden with dust. The temperature is so high that the body seems to be on a slow roast. In such a setting, a new world…
One of the one percent in 13 million. [Text and photo by Mayank Austen Soofi] It is midnight. The pavement on Lodhi Road is immersed in darkness, but you can see figures slumped along it, presumably asleep. One spot on…
All the Delhis. [Text and photos by Mayank Austen Soofi] In Delhi, several centuries live together — and here’s a rare place where you get to see all those centuries in a single eye sweep. The Jami Masjid at Feroze…
Summer’s gift. [Text and photos by Mayank Austen Soofi] The park has no grass. Tailor “master” Mehmood Alam enters this dull brown earth, lays out a mat towards the west and starts to offer his evening prayers. The scene is…
One of the one percent in 13 million. [Text and photo by Mayank Austen Soofi] No customers are coming to Pandit Om Prakash. The astrologer’s pavement stall is very modest, but a longtime landmark in the area, here in Gurgaon,…
Poetry in the city. [By Mayank Austen Soofi] Her Dhaka is full of rickshaws. She often took late night rides in them to the old city, for a quick seekh at Bismillah hotel, or for a sherbet at Royal. It…
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