Netherfield Ball – Spotting Retired Justice Leila Seth in Her Memorial Meeting, India International Center City Parties by The Delhi Walla - May 31, 2017May 31, 20174 The party secrets. [Text and photos by Mayank Austen Soofi] The women were dressed in subdued but elegant saris. The men, too, looked dignified. There were many famous faces. One evening The Delhi Walla attended the memorial meeting of Retired Justice Leila Seth at the Multipurpose Hall in India International Center The evening's most important people were members of Ms Seth's immediate family-- husband Prem, sons Vikram and Shantum, daughter Aradhna, daughter-in-law, Gitanjali, and grand-daughters Nandini and Anamikamaitri. Even so, I declare the occasion was extremely puzzling. Apparently, Ms Seth passed away in her 80s a few weeks ago. But I spotted her more than once in the gathering--there she was, and there, and there, as always. You don't believe me? See below. The
City Notice – Mint Lounge Newspaper on The Delhi Walla’s Role in the Cover of Arundhati Roy’s Novel ‘The Ministry of Utmost Happiness’ General by The Delhi Walla - May 28, 2017May 28, 20173 On a novel cover. So The Delhi Walla has finally found a place in literature. The four-page cover story by writer Elizabeth Kuruvilla on the 27 May 2017 edition of Mint Lounge is on Arundhati Roy's new novel The Ministry of Utmost Happiness. The story fleetingly mentions an "Indian journalist" who "shot the cover photograph" of the book. Click here to read that story, or read below. Dilliwallahs have a new lexicon for the seasons they encounter. We now identify them according to the specific kinds of illnesses we need to fend off, or the PM level in the air we breathe. So writer and photographer Mayank Austen Soofi (an employee of HT Media, which publishes Mint), on being asked when Arundhati Roy
Our Self-Written Obituaries – Bijaya Biswal, Cuttack, Odisha Farewell Notice by The Delhi Walla - May 26, 2017May 26, 20171 The 146th death. [Text by Bijaya Biswal; photo by Piyush Sawant] 22 years old Bijaya Biswal was found dead in her apartment on Good Friday, with her head buried in a book like a dried rose bud. The book was Goethe's The Sorrows of Young Werther, which allegedly had begun a suicide epidemic in Germany two hundred years ago. Ms Biswal's doctor says she had a prolonged history of being easily overwhelmed by dreams, often mistaking it for real life. There have been days she wandered around the house swift as a gust of winter breeze, quoting “Death must be so beautiful. To lie in the soft brown earth, with grasses waving above one’s head, and listen to silence. To have no yesterday,
100 Things To Do Before You Quit Delhi – Hang Out in CP Starbucks at Midnight, A-Block, Connaught Place Hangouts by The Delhi Walla - May 24, 2017May 30, 20171 The perfect Delhi experience. [Text and photos by Mayank Austen Soofi] At the stroke of the midnight hour, when Delhi sleeps, you must awake to life at the Starbucks in Connaught Place (CP). Spending an hour from midnight onwards at this particular coffee chain outlet is one of the things you ought to do before quitting Delhi for good. Here, in the heart of the night, you sit safely ensconced in the heart of CP, which lies in the heart of the capital. Please note The Delhi Walla strictly means the bigger of the two Starbucks outlets in this colonial-era district—at Hamilton House in A Block. The other at N-block serves the same varieties of drinks and snacks, but it’s smaller and
Mission Delhi – Arshad Ali, Hazrat Nizamuddin Auliya’s Dargah Mission Delhi by The Delhi Walla - May 22, 2017May 22, 20173 One of the one percent in 13 million. [Text and photos by Mayank Austen Soofi] Sometimes the stuff you see in song-and-dance movies repeats itself in real life. In 2011, Hindi film Rockstar depicted its hero — a young Delhi man played by actor Ranbir Kapoor — being forced to leave his home, along with his guitar, and finding shelter in the Sufi shrine of Hazrat Nizamuddin Auliya. In the film’s chartbuster qawwali, the hard-luck protagonist is shown sleeping in the dargah during the late hours of the night. Well, during the late hours of a recent night The Delhi Walla saw exactly such a sight in Hazrat Nizamuddin’s shrine. A young man was sleeping on one side of the dargah’s courtyard, his head
Netherfield Ball – An Unexpected Mr Darcy Eclipsed Anuja Chauhan’s Husband’s Society Debut During Her Book Launch, Lady Baga City Parties by The Delhi Walla - May 19, 2017May 19, 20171 The party secrets. [Text and photos by Mayank Austen Soofi] He was good looking and gentlemanlike; he had a pleasant countenance, and easy, unaffected manners. And he was the novelist’s husband. But Niret Alva was not tempting enough to be a Mister Darcy. One evening The Delhi Walla attended the launch of Anuja Chauhan’s novel Baaz at Lady Baga in Connaught Place. The beautiful Ms Chauhan wore a long stylish gown the lower part of which was cut in the middle to discreetly reveal her shapely legs. But I’m in no humour at present to give consequence to the vanities of women writers when the evening saw such a fine figure of man. He was handsome. His moustache was handsomer. He was immaculately dressed
The Delhi Proustians – Life With Marcel in Bahrisons Booksellers & Vasant Vihar Delhi Proustians by The Delhi Walla - May 18, 20171 Living with Proust. [Text and photos by Mayank Austen Soofi] She lifts the small white envelope from inside the table drawer, carefully takes out the fragile piece of paper within, and unfolds it carefully with a tweezer. It is merely a bookstore’s cash memo — Rs 290.94 — for a book titled Remembrance of Things Past. That‘s the English translation of the seven-volume French novel by Marcel Proust, which today costs more than Rs 4,000. The Delhi Walla is in south Delhi’s Safdarjung Enclave at a bungalow of the family that owns Bahrisons Booksellers. The seemingly banal record of a commercial transaction is in the possession of Aanchal Malhotra, the eldest daughter of the couple who runs the capital’s oldest surviving English-language bookshop in Khan
Atget’s Corner – 1026-1030, Delhi Photos Delhi Pics by The Delhi Walla - May 16, 20171 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 1026 to 1030. 1026. Vasant Vihar 1027. Sadar Bazaar 1028.
Our Self-Written Obituaries – Surabhi Sharman, Lajpat Nagar Farewell Notice by The Delhi Walla - May 14, 2017May 14, 20170 The 145th death. [Text by Surabhi Sharman; photos by Kriti Chawla, above, and, below, by Carmen Hamady] Surabhi Sharman, a 23-year-old young adult was discovered dead in her small apartment in Delhi on May 4. Ms Sharman was discovered by her friends (who had come to wish her 'Happy Birthday') and her landlord (who had come to collect the due rent) in the early hours of the morning. The cause of death remains a mystery, although, close sources believe that she gave herself a disease or two while binge watching the American TV drama Grey’s Anatomy. Ms Sharman had often expressed her wish to be buried instead of being cremated, since she had always feared fire. Her religious Hindu grandmother refused to comply with
City Notice – The Delhi Walla is Looking for One Night Stands, Around Town General by The Delhi Walla - May 12, 2017May 13, 20171 One night in the city. [Text and photos by Mayank Austen Soofi] The Delhi Walla needs your help. I have a dream to spend a night in each of Delhi’s hundreds of neighborhoods. I want to kill a part of the dark hours walking aimlessly along the streets (preferably with you) and the rest at a private home in that locality (preferably in your house). But there’s a problem. I have many friends in the city, to be sure, but not enough to have a friend in each neighborhood. Therefore, I request you to invite me to spend a night with you in your neighborhood and in your home. Don't be suspicious. I’m told that despite being a Delhi man, I’m reasonably decent with