Home Sweet Home – Moongey Wali Kothi, Katra Khushal Rai Delhi Homes by The Delhi Walla - February 27, 2017March 1, 20172 A whole world. [Text and photos by Mayank Austen Soofi] It is easy to identify a haveli in Old Delhi. The tell-tale sign is an archway that usually hosts a half-awake stray dog. Within, a passage leads to a forecourt filled with clothes drying or alive with potted plants. In one corner, there could be a person lying supine on a charpoy. Most of all, it’s a labyrinth of courtyards, staircases, roofs and balconies. What would the great Urdu poet Ghalib have felt knowing that his haveli in Ballimaran had become a coal yard? Next to nothing survives of the Haksar Haveli in Sitaram Bazaar, where Jawaharlal Nehru, who would go on to become India’s first prime minister, married Kamala Kaul. These two
Our Self-Written Obituaries – Maria Faraz, Cantt., Lahore, Pakistan Farewell Notice by The Delhi Walla - February 23, 20170 The 138th death. [Text by Maria Faraz; photo by Faraz Jahangir] Everyone thinks a psychologist knows everything, a proverbial mind-reader, magical being, twister of fates.... But she was an ordinary woman. Drawn to her destiny by the strings of circumstance and successful only because she believed in what she practiced. She spent her energy always with abandon, never caring where or when she'd find more. She was brazen. Maria Faraz passed on this afternoon of March while the slanting rays of the sun pierced through the jacaranda trees, as she reclined on rattan in her painstakingly perfect garden among coloured grasses procured from the plateaus of Jehlum. The breeze was as soft on the swaying grass as it was on her wrinkle-less face
City Food – Muhammed Rafi’s 40-Year-Old Rooh Afza Drink Stall, Turkman Gate Food by The Delhi Walla - February 21, 2017February 21, 20171 Summer's great hero. [Text and photos by Mayank Austen Soofi] The arrival of Delhi summer can be ascertained in a number of ways. A poetic way is to look for the yellow flowers of Amaltas trees. The Delhi Walla’s summer truly begins with the re-emergence of Muhammed Rafi in Turkman Gate. It is behind this Mughal-era gateway of the Walled City that the capital’s signature season acquires a comforting metaphor in the shape of Mr Rafi’s Rooh Afza drink stall. For more than 40 years, this elderly man has been cooling parched throats with this refreshing rose-flavored drink. His establishment remains closed in the winter. “I re-opened the stall last Saturday,” Mr Rafi told me in his customary understated tone. His cart consists of
City Season – Discovering The New Summer Through Delhi Sky, Around Town Nature by The Delhi Walla - February 20, 2017February 20, 20172 Intimations of a new season. [Text and photos by Mayank Austen Soofi] Delhi’s seasons are extreme. Winters are so freezing that it is impossible to imagine that this city could ever survive even a gentle rise in temperature. Summers are so intolerably hot that winter seems as out of reach as Saint Petersburg. Yet, the shift of seasons in Delhi is so imperceptible that before you know it the winter has already changed to summer. (We don’t have a place for spring, really.) It was not the case this year, however. The first day of summer arrived with a majestic ceremony in the evening sky. The small puffs of white clouds spread into the clear blue as undisciplined cotton from a torn pillow.
City Monument – Sunehri Masjid, Chandni Chowk Monuments by The Delhi Walla - February 18, 20172 Remembering the Delhi massacre. [Text and photos by Mayank Austen Soofi] 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 22 March, Nader mounted his horse and rode from the palace to the Roshan-od-Dowala mosque (the former name of Sunehri Masjid). As he arrived there with his men about him, some people threw stones from balconies and windows around the mosque, and a shot was fired, killing an officer beside him. He had already made up his mind, but this final insult may have added fury to Nader’s frustration.
Netherfield Ball – The Invasion of the Bearded Men at Sanjay Kak’s Book Launch, India Habitat Center City Parties by The Delhi Walla - February 16, 2017February 16, 20172 The party secrets. [Text and photos by Mayank Austen Soofi] Even the mere thought triggers hair-raising pain. Were Kashmir to break off its marriage to India, and the Indian army were to quit Kashmir, our beloved motherland would lose its manly face. For what is Kashmir but India's beard? This anatomical reality became as clear as a hairy man's waxed chest when The Delhi Walla attended the launch of Sanjay Kak's book Witness: Kashmir 1986-2016: 9 Photographers. The evening offered a spectacle beyond belief—a great number of Kashmiri men and all of them with a beard. Mr Kak had a beard. Photographer Kaushik Ramaswamy, who, incidentally, is a true Indian—his father was Tamilian and his mother is Bengali—also had a beard. Even the
City Life – La La Land of The NDMC, VIP Delhi Life by The Delhi Walla - February 15, 20171 The great gap. [Text and photos by Mayank Austen Soofi] This is no place for the aam aadmi, or common man. A sign near the Supreme Court declares the limits of the New Delhi Municipal Council (NDMC) zone, which has some of the most expensive real estate in Asia, like Khan Market and Amrita Shergil Marg. Some of the most important people in the country, including the President, Prime Minister, Cabinet ministers, senior bureaucrats and ambassadors of powerful nations, reside in the NDMC zone. If the common man is here, it is generally on work. Soon he must exit, casting a glance at the signboard: “NDMC Limit Ends”. How is the life like in NDMC? What exactly is the NDMC state of mind? “It was so
Delhi’s Bandaged Heart – Akhil Katyal’s Poem ‘He was as arrogant as a Chattarpur Farmhouse’, Jangpura Extension City Poetry by The Delhi Walla - February 14, 2017February 14, 20171 Poetry in the city. [Text and photos by Mayank Austen Soofi] He shares his second-floor flat with Agha Shahid Ali and they often sleep together. He has that deep bond with The Veiled Suite, the late Kashmiri poet’s collected poetry—the paperback is lying beside his pillow. One evening The Delhi Walla meets poet Akhil Katyal at his apartment in Jangpura Extension. An assistant professor of English and Creative Writing at Shiv Nadar University, Mr Katyal teaches poems by Agha Shahid Ali and Faiz Ahmed Faiz, among others. With no disrespect to his writing table, it has to be admitted that Mr Katyal mostly writes on his bed (notice the laptop there in the photo 1 below). Explaining his private process of poetry writing, he
Atget’s Corner – 1001-1005, Delhi Photos Delhi Pics by The Delhi Walla - February 12, 2017February 12, 20170 The visible city. [By Mayank Austen Soofi] Delhi is a voyeur’s paradise and The Delhi Walla also makes pictures. I take photos of people, streets, flowers, eateries, drawing rooms, tombs, landscapes, buses, colleges, Sufi shrines, trees, animals, autos, libraries, birds, courtyards, kitchens and old buildings. My archive of more than 1,00,000 photos showcases Delhi’s ongoing evolution. Five randomly picked pictures from this collection are regularly put up on the pages of this website. The series is named in the memory of French artist Eugène Atget (1857-1927), who, in the words of a biographer, was an “obsessed photographer determined to document every corner of Paris before it disappeared under the assault of modern improvements.” Here are Delhi photos numbered 1001 to 1005. 1001. Seelampuri 1002. Curzon Road 1003. Fatehpuri
Photo Essay – The Deceitful Sky Over Our Jealous Jama Masjid, Old Delhi Photo Essays by The Delhi Walla - February 10, 2017February 10, 20174 Beauty lost. [Text and photos by Mayank Austen Soofi] What's gone wrong with Jama Masjid?! It is morning and the grand Mughal-era mosque is still standing on its centuries-old spot but there is no trace of its yesterday’s grandness. It is looking nothing special. The glorious beauty has been hijacked by the February sky. But dear Jama Masjid, weep not and please do not burn out with envy. Always remember we are the world’s most polluted city and this sky has been lent to us merely on temporary loan. It will be taken back and you shall regain your glory. And O you deceptive sky, you are not one of us and The Delhi Walla refuses to fall in love with you. Season's illusions 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6. 7. 8. 9. 10. 11.