Photo Essay – The Rebirth of an Old House, Old Delhi Photo Essays by The Delhi Walla - October 20, 2016October 20, 20166 Time regained. [Text and photos by Mayank Austen Soofi] In Delhi, there is a place called Old Delhi. In Old Delhi, there are many, many narrow alleys, so narrow that the sun never penetrates into them. One such narrow lane has an old house. It has old doors, old windows, old tiles, old fireplaces, old dust-covered books, old mirrors and even old-style wash basins (see picture 19 below). It has multiple sets of staircases, multiple sets of balconies, and multiple sets of terraces. The faded blue walls look like Pacific Ocean. The old house, however, usually remains empty. Now, a family is moving in and the old house is being made new. Some early elements have already been replaced. New elements are being added. The house will soon regain life. The Delhi Walla captures this delicate time in shift. New life 1. 1a. 2. 3. 4. 4a. 5. 6. 7. 8. 9. 10. 11. 12. 13. 14. 15. 16. 17. 18. 19. 20. 21. FacebookX Related Related posts: Photo Essay – Delhi Dream, Scindia House Photo Essay – The Aloofness of a Man in the Indian Coffee House Photo Essay – The Fire, Himalaya House Photo Essay – Indian Coffee House, Mohan Singh Place Photo Essay – Delhi@Night
Mehrauli aka Dhillika/Dhilli/Yoginipura is perhaps the closest we can get to the ‘original city of Delhi’. It is very likely that this early-medieval settlement gave the city its name. People from Old Delhi/Shahjahanabad were aware of the fact that there existed ‘Delhis’ that were a lot older than their city. For example, Old Fort and the settlements around it were called Dehli-e Kuhna (Old Delhi) and some Shahjahanabadis were familiar with the killi-dhilli legend of Mehrauli.
Hi Mayank, really beautiful photographs. Tells a rather poignant story. But the site header is too broad, so it really distracts the viewing experience, particularly in the case of photo essays! I have to struggle to fit a photo within the frame to view it fully. Please do something about this soon! Change the wordpress template to something that suits images, perhaps? or reduce the number of keywords/tags that appear on the header? or work with both hashtags and keywords, with the latter being generic (and minimal) and the former more specific (and elaborate)? Because its a shame that a site that is so image centric doesn’t offer a similar viewing experience.
An Amazing article to be read. These are the reminiscences of old grandeur Delhi that existed once, only being lost into oblivion. I just came across a historic book, that will be given a new lift off after having spent many years in darkness. Request you to pls tell the book’s name and its author.