Russia in Delhi. [Text and photos by Mayank Austen Soofi] Go to Janpath, and visit a man there with a long flowing beard. Leo Tolstoy stands by the traffic light. It is the Russian writer’s 114th death anniversary. Tolstoy made a most profound impact on the Indian who most profoundly shaped contemporary India. Mahatma Gandhi was famously influenced by Tolstoy’s ideas on non-violence and chastity. He even set up an ashram called Tolstoy Farm during his years in South Africa. That said, the novelist of Anna Karenina is not the only Russian gracing the Delhi boulevards. Poet Pushkin stands at Mandi House. And though the Soviet Union founder Lenin was no novelist, he stands tall in Nehru Park. Indeed, those Delhiwale who came

Walled City's primary graveyard. [Text and photo by Mayank Austen Soofi] One morning, a funeral procession in Old Delhi halts the rush-hour flow of autos in front of Delite Cinema. The mourners are carrying a janaza towards the direction of Dilli Gate Qabristan. The graveyard behind the newspaper offices on Bahadur Shah Zafar Marg happens to be the final address of thousands of Purani Dilli’s Muslim dwellers. It is as dense with graves as Meena Bazar is with machinery stores. Located slightly outside the Walled City’s vanished walls, the qabristan contains some of contemporary Old Delhi’s most distinguished gentry. Urdu poet Mushir Jhinjhianvi, who lived in a house overlooking Chitli Qabar Chowk, lies buried somewhere amid this sprawl. So does the great

A corner off the chaos. [Text and photo by Mayank Austen Soofi] In a megapolis of millions, here’s a table for two. It is actually a bench, and this afternoon two citizens sitting on it are sharing a meal from the same plate. The next bench has a citizen in kurta-pajama lying sprawled along its length, sleeping. The setting could be a public park with grass, flowers and trees. Nothing of that sort. It is all concrete. This infrastructure utility came up six years ago in central Delhi, and is part of a network of pedestrian overpasses, called sky walk, connecting the Supreme Court metro station to scores of tree-lined avenues that span out of the area. For many citizens, this corner

Rembrandt's Dilli. [Text and photos by Mayank Austen Soofi] That’s a Charles Correa. The Connaught Place edifice, Jeevan Bharti, is gigantic, and the front facade looks like a dizzyingly complex network of grids. The late architect designed the capital’s many other noteworthy complexes as well--Tara Apartments, Crafts Museum, and the British Council. But this evening the CP building has transmogrified into something profounder, almost supernatural. The cause is the extraordinary pre-winter sunset that faithfully returns to Delhi skies at this time of the year, just before the annual arrival of the extreme smog. It is half past five and the mid-October sun is dipping behind the Correa creation. The building is partly glowing in gold, though most of the panorama (including the rush-hour

The Dushera ground [Text and photo by Mayank Austen Soofi] Bhagwan Ram exiled. Maa Sita abducted. In the end, sinful Ravan punished. As is the tradition every year around the Dusshera, hundreds of Ramlilas are currently being staged in Delhi. This 10-day theatrical representation of Bhagwan Ram’s epic revolves around both mortals and immortals, as familiar to us as our own family and friends. One of the places hosting the Ramlila is Ramlila Maidan, the vast grounds outside the Walled City’s vanished walls. The Maidan’s Ramlila began on Thursday evening. (This photo of the crowded audience is from the previous year’s Ramlila). Once upon a time there was no Ramlila Maidan. The whole area was a keekar jungle teeming with geedar. This is the

On independent Delhi's greatest architect. [Text and photo by Mayank Austen Soofi] This Sunday, 6 October, is the 23rd death anniversary of post-independent Delhi’s greatest architect. Here’s his legacy in 23 points. 1. Joseph Stein’s modernistic designs took cues from India’s past, each consisting of a bunch of buildings fused with trees, gardens, pools. 2. Stein was born in the US, and completed his masters in architecture from the University of Illinois, and post-graduate studies at Cranbrook Academy, near Detroit, under architect Eliel Saarinen and sculptor Carl Milles. 3. Stein’s early career involved working in California. He was briefly in Mexico, where he became friends with the legendary Frida Kahlo. 4.

One more layer over the past [Text and photos by Mayank Austen Soofi] The sky is blue. The market is bluer. This is the same old Kashmere Gate, just touched up a bit. The blue was rendered early this year by the local market’s association, says a shopkeeper. To be sure, Kashmere Gate’s Bara Bazar is a sprawling enterprise filled with a variety of businesses. The blue is limited to its handsome colonnade that overlooks the historic St James Church. A dark cerulean shade has been painted on the colonnade’s slim metallic columns, on its intricately patterned wrought iron screens, on the corridor’s ceiling, and also on the shop shutters. The blue shirt of a fruit seller stationed outside the colonnade this afternoon

Life in a mansion. [Text and photo by Mayank Austen Soofi] It I s a mansion only in name. In its contemporary avatar, Haveli Anwar Ali resembles to some extent a typical Old Delhi street. Like any Purani Dilli gali, it too comprises of residences and shops. The mansion’s sole portion that remains wholly intact—at least in the publicly accessible part—is the sandstone gateway. The darwaza is sculpted with taaks, arches and flowery patterns. Its two tall wooden panels lie detached, leaning against their respective walls. These panels are severely discoloured. One shows a faded “STD ISD PCO” sign, indicating the long-ago presence of a phone booth. Another has the haveli’s name etched in Urdu, as pointed by a passer-by. The haveli’s more

A pre-partition edifice. [Text and photos by Mayank Austen Soofi] This greyish Old Delhi landmark is simply known as “building.” The storeyed structure looks profoundly different from the surrounding storeyed structures. It is decidedly more elegant in an old-fashioned way, apparent even to those among us with no insights on architecture. The “building” stands at Mohalla Qabristan Chowk, and is the vicinity’s only pre-partition edifice still wholly intact. The intersection has been visited on these pages, but the “building” is demanding an exclusive appraisal. A much taller multi-storey has lately risen right in front of it. The development is significant. Until the turn of the century, the “building” used to be the tallest in this part of the Walled City. Its initial presence was