[Text and photos by Mayank Austen Soofi] He had never encountered the word “entrepreneur” until February last year. “I first heard it in a computer class,” says Kaunen. “I then joined a two week free class on how to start…
Music in twilight. [Text and photos by Mayank Austen Soofi] Can you hear? Here comes one of these songs again. The ones about love and heartbreak. The singer’s voice is tinged with ache and is getting shriller with the heightened…
[Text and photos by Mayank Austen Soofi] The year is 1985. Place: Departure terminal, Rome airport. They knew they would not meet ever again. Moghul was flying to his home in Lahore, Pakistan, and Pramod Kumar Padhy was returning to…
Private is public. [Text and photos by Mayank Austen Soofi] A blue lungi is hanging in front of a shuttered shop, folded within a mishmash of power cables. Nearby, a baniyan and underwear are on a similar exhibit. Across the…
[Text and photos by Mayank Austen Soofi] There was no window in his single-bed ward at the Covid-designated ICU. But there was a large one in the adjacent ward, connected to his by an open door, and he could see…
A lonely planet. [Text and photos by Mayank Austen Soofi] The world is so much at turbulence. But here, all is at peace. Which isn’t surprising for this is a graveyard. Shidipura Qabristan, near Filmistan Cinema in central Delhi, isn’t…
The parlour confession. [Text and photos by Mayank Austen Soofi] She’s 85 and so elegant, stately, regal and her white hair is so beautiful—even on the phone screen. Actor Sushma Seth is chatting on WhatsApp video from the home in…
[Text and photos by Mayank Austen Soofi] Her husband makes yummy chicken curry. “But we haven’t had it for a long time,” says Kamni. Her reason is simple enough. “I no longer earn as much as I used to before…
The sights of the pandemic. [Text and photos by Mayank Austen Soofi] When the markets shut down, when the metro stopped running, when those who had the luxury of a house exiled themselves within the walls of those houses, when…
Masked new world. [Text and photos by Mayank Austen Soofi] Clean, bright and sanitized. And silent. As the Delhi Metro reopened, more than five months after coronavirus changed the world, its scenery is weirdly reminiscent of ‘2001: A Space Odyssey’,…
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