The poet’s place. Opened from sunrise to sunset, the mausoleum of Urdu poet Mirza Asadullah Beg Khan Ghalib usually remains empty. His rectangular tomb chamber is in Hazrat Nizamuddin Basti, a central Delhi village named after a Sufi saint who lived here in the 14th century and...
Read More »

The water resorts. The heat is oppressive. Down the stone stairs. Shade. The wet sari clinging to her skin, Zeenat Begum is washing herself in cool water. The pool is covered with the yellow leaves of kikar. “It’s my hamam,” says the elderly woman. Picking up her...
Read More »

The home of headless ghosts. Khooni Darwaza means ‘bloodied gateway’ and legend has it that blood drips from its ceilings during the monsoon. Built by Sher Shah Suri in 1540 it is in the in the middle of the four-lane Bahadurshah Zafar Marg connecting New and Old...
Read More »

Remembering the Delhi massacre. It was from Sunehri Masjid that the Persian invader Nader Shah watched the massacre of Delhi in March, 1739. In his book The Sword of Persia: Nader Shah, from Tribal Warrior to Conquering Tyrant, British author Michael Axworthy writes: On the morning of...
Read More »

Reflections of faith. Built by a Sikh general in 1783, this gurudwara, or Sikh temple, has an expansive compound and a large sarovar (holy pond). Dedicated to Guru Har Kishan, the eighth Sikh guru, it was so named because it is on the site of the bungalow...
Read More »

Poet’s last home. Every 27 December, on Ghalib’s birthday, his admirers march to his haveli in Shahjahanabad with lighted candles and give sound bites to the media on the poet’s relevance. As if he needs this lip service(!) What Shakespeare is to the English language, Mirza Ghalib...
Read More »

Marooned palace. Every year after the monsoons, this ravaged monument whose name means “ship palace” hosts music, dance and acting. It becomes the focal point of cultural activities marking Phoolwalon ki Sair, a festival in which floral tributes are paid to two premier Hindu and Muslim shrines...
Read More »

The fifth city. Built as the citadel of Firoz Shah Tughlaq, along the banks of the Yamuna, this is now a ruin. Firuzabad, the fifth city of Delhi, once extended from Hauz Khas to Pir-Ghaib (near Bara Hindu Rao hospital) but most buildings were vandalized during the...
Read More »

The resting place of Delhi’s great poet-saint. It is one of Delhi’s most melancholic monuments. The tomb of Khwaja Mir Dard (1721-1785), an Urdu poet and a Sufi saint, is beautiful, but not in a conventional way. It has no dome. Situated near Zakir Husain College, next...
Read More »

Ruins in a landscaped setting. The Lodhi Garden in central Delhi is famous for its flowers, trees, birds and sloping lawns but before the garden there were the tombs. Built by the Sayyids (1414-1451) and Lodhis (1451-1526), who once ruled the Delhi sultanate, the tombs, now ruined,...
Read More »