City Faith – Praying for The Children, Behram Khan Tiraha Faith by The Delhi Walla - March 31, 2016March 31, 20165 Mother's festival. [Text and photos by Mayank Austen Soofi] They were performing a sacred ceremony in the middle of the road. One early morning The Delhi Walla saw about half a dozen barefoot women at Behram Khan Tiraha, a three-way avenue sheltered by a giant peepal tree in Old Delhi. There were also a few children. The women were carefully arranging small earthen bowls on the road. Some of those bowls were filled with uncooked rice grains, some with yellow lentils, and some with tiny deep-fried pooris; others had sweets of different kinds. A few also had rose petals. One woman told me, “Today is the festival of Basora. It comes after Holi. The winter has ended and the hot season is about to
Netherfield Ball – Explosive Clash Averted at William Dalrymple’s Opening Bash, Vadhera Art Gallery, Defence Colony City Parties by The Delhi Walla - March 29, 2016March 30, 20163 The party secrets. [Text and photos by Mayank Austen Soofi] It was a countdown to the nuclear war. Two superstar Indian journalists ended up almost within an inch of annihilation. The Delhi Walla watched the spectacle with bated breath one evening during the opening of the photo exhibition of author William Dalrymple at Vadhera Art Gallery in South Delhi’s Defence Colony. This is how it happened. Manu Joseph--who quit the editorship of the Open news magazine after the arrival of the new Prime Minister in Delhi--came within kissing distance of his successor, S. Prasannarajan--who overnight turned the magazine from being anti-Prime Minister to pro-Prime Minister. As these important and honorable men found themselves very close to each other, their faces were emptied of all expressions.
Delhi’s Bandaged Heart – Rajeev Anil Roark, Perch, Khan Market City Poetry by The Delhi Walla - March 29, 2016March 29, 20163 Poetry in the city. [Text and photos by Mayank Austen Soofi] His life is like an unmentionable dream. During the day, he makes coffee; at night, he makes poems. His necessary companions: Marlboro and Remington. And once a woman posed without clothes for his camera. One afternoon The Delhi Walla meets poet Rajeev Anil Roark at Perch, the Wine and Coffee Bar in Central Delhi’s Khan Market. Mr Roark, who takes his last name from an Ayn Rand character, is a Coffee Master here. “When you have a poem read by ten thousand people, then it separates into ten thousand meanings,” says Mr Roark, as he makes a cup of Ethiopian Sidamo coffee for me at Perch’s Coffee Lab. “Similarly, when ten thousand
City Notice – Artist Dayanita Singh’s Gift To The Delhi Walla Website, Museum of Chance General by The Delhi Walla - March 28, 20167 A beautiful gesture. [Text and photos by Mayank Austen Soofi] One evening at the Museum of Chance in South Delhi’s Kiran Nadar Museum of Art, artist Dayanita Singh, in front of a gathering of some of the city’s fine people, awarded The Delhi Walla website with the title of ‘Archivist of Delhi’. Later, after everyone had left and the museum was empty, she gifted me a copy of her book House of Love. In her inscription, Ms Singh wrote: For Mayank Austen Soofi, 50,000 rupees deposited at Digital Image Solutions for you to make two book dummies—after we have had two sessions on the pleasures of composing/building a physical book even though finally it may well be an e-book. Dayanita Singh c/o Museum of Chance, Museum Bhawan 27.3.16 Dayanita Singh's
City Moment – The Late Night Street Qawwali, Hazrat Nizamuddin Basti Moments by The Delhi Walla - March 27, 2016March 27, 20161 The memorable instant. [Text and photos by Mayank Austen Soofi] Most of the street was immersed in darkness. But one corner was flooded with light. There, a makeshift stage had come up on the middle of the lane. A roof of plastic sheets had been laid out over the stage. One midnight The Delhi Walla was in Hazrat Nizamuddin Basti, a historic village that takes its name from a 14th century Sufi saint. His shrine lies at the end of the aforementioned street. The street looked abandoned at this late hour but the stage was filled with qawwal musicians—all of them, including a child, belonged to the house of Nizami Khusro Bandhu family, whose patriarch, the great Meraj Ahmad, died late last year.
City Notice for 4 PM, 27 March – Artist Dayanita Singh To Celebrate The Delhi Walla Website as Delhi’s Archivist General by The Delhi Walla - March 26, 2016March 26, 20161 On cloud nine. [By Mayank Austen Soofi] The Delhi Walla has never met the great Dayanita Singh although she lives in Delhi. Of course, I have come to know her over the years through her books. I also once sighted her in Khan Market but had no guts to approach her. And this week the artist wrote on her Facebook, saying: I have been watching Mayank Austen Soofi for a while now and am very very impressed with the form he has made for himself, between literature and photography, between documentary and fiction. And while he works in the virtual world, he will receive a book dummy grant, so I can share with him the pleasure of building a physical book. On 27th March, he
City Life – The Book Shop Walks With Bahrisons Booksellers, Jor Bagh Life by The Delhi Walla - March 25, 2016March 25, 20161 Two landmarks. [Text and photos by Mayank Austen Soofi] They are walking together. One evening The Delhi Walla sees Nini KD Singh and Aanchal Malhotra at a public park in the quiet Jor Bagh. The two women are intimately connected to two similar but separate—some might even say rival—institutions that add beauty and friendliness to this city. Ms Singh is the wife of KD Singh, with whom she founded The Book Shop in Jor Bagh in 1970. Ms Malhotra is the granddaughter of Balraj Bahri Malhotra, who founded the Bahrisons Booksellers in Khan Market in 1953. Ms Singh and her husband went on to open a second outlet of The Book Shop in Khan Market. It was just a few steps away from
Mission Delhi – Catherine Lama, Lodhi Road Mission Delhi by The Delhi Walla - March 23, 2016March 23, 20164 One of the one percent in 13 million. [Text and photos by Mayank Austen Soofi] A red rose is tucked into her hair. A green scarf is tied under her chin. Her wrinkled hands lie folded on her lap. Her luxuriously embroidered sandals are beside her bare feet. Aged and regal-looking, she could as well be at her breakfast parlour. She is actually sitting inside a pavement shack, where she is a guest. One afternoon The Delhi Walla meets Catherine Lama on Lodhi Road. Ms Lama is resting against a bundle of blankets. This little space on the brick-lined pavement is an entire house--the roof is a plastic sheet. The dwelling belongs to a family of beggars who spend their day
Delhi Proustians – First Meeting With Marcel, Venice Delhi Proustians by The Delhi Walla - March 23, 20161 First day, first show. [Text and photos by Mayank Austen Soofi] Very soon, his life will revolve around a single object—a book with 2,058 pages. And if in this world of million distractions he manages to read even five pages daily, it will still take him more than a year to finish the entire novel. One evening The Delhi Walla meets literature student Lucio De Capitani outside the church of San Giobbe in the watery city of Venice. Mr de Capitani is all smiles. He is walking with a newly-purchased copy of Alla Ricerca Del Tempo Perduto. The Italian edition of French novelist’s timeless work, À La Recherche Du Temps Perdu, is known in the English speaking world as In Search of Lost
Netherfield Ball – Sadia Dehlvi’s Grand Bash, Nizamuddin East City Parties by The Delhi Walla - March 22, 2016March 22, 20162 The party secrets. [Text and photos by Mayank Austen Soofi] Everybody who is somebody in Delhi is Sadia Dehlvi's friend. That doesn’t mean that the author of Sufism: The Heart of Islam does not have important friends outside Delhi. One recent evening The Delhi Walla gatecrashed a party that Ms Dehlvi had hosted at her drawing room in Hazrat Nizamuddin East to celebrate her women friends from across the world. The fortunate few included a poet from Saudi Arabia (Nimah Nawwab), a Syrian human rights activist from Canada (Afra Jalabi) and a Sufi poet from Pakistan (Sumbal Iftikhar). The domestic guests were some of the capital’s very important names. Delhi’s former Chief Minister Sheila Dikshit arrived with her sister, the graceful Rama Dhawan.