City Home – Saira Bano & Family, Gali Chandi Wali
Home sweet home [Text and photos by Mayank Austen Soofi] An entire household is contained in this room. This household contains a life that has largely disappeared. The second floor apartment in Old Delhi’s Gali Chandi Wali houses a family…
City Home – Fareed Mirza, Bazar Shah Abul Khair Marg
Old home glossary. [Text and photos by Mayank Austen Soofi] Suburb-like flats are taking over Old Delhi’s traditional makaan, or houses. Here’s a glossary of domestic spaces soon to be lost to legends. This afternoon, building material merchant Fareed Mirza…
Delhi Homes – Barsati, Around Town
The vanishing rain shelter. [Text and photos by Mayank Austen Soofi] It is raining hard on the terrace of an 18th floor flat in Gurgaon’s Golf Course Road. Monsoon is giddily beating down on this multitude of high-rises. Yet, it…
City Home – Ruined Bungalow, Somewhere in Delhi
A deserted home. [Text and photos by Mayank Austen Soofi] The metal gate is splotched with red dots of rust. The pane-less windows on the first floor stare out like open wounds. Cobwebs are hanging from window grills. It is…
City Homes – Dayanita Singh’s Book Walls, Vasant Vihar
Inside an artist’s studio. [Text and photos by Mayank Austen Soofi] Dayanita Singh lives amid moving walls of her books. This afternoon, at her second floor studio in Vasant Vihar, the artist appears by sliding away one of the walls….
Home Sweet Home – Tailor “Master” Javed Iqbal’s Dwelling, Chitli Qabar Chowk
A new house. [Text and photo by Mayank Austen Soofi] The mattress is spread across the floor. The cooking gas cylinder is in the kitchen, already connected to the double-burner gas range. Two plastic buckets are in the bathroom. All…
Home Sweet Home – Abida’s Dwelling, Under Oberoi Hotel Flyover
A woman’s house. [Text and photo by Mayank Austen Soofi] The evening is mildly cold. Abida and Raja are at home, sitting by the fireside. Raja has their month-old son, Piraili, on his lap. Wrapped in layers of woollens, the…
City Home – Homeless Shelter, Central Delhi
A home for the houseless. [By Mayank Austen Soofi] The floor is of plywood. The roof appears to be of white tarpaulin. The walls, too, are of the same white material. There are no windows. This is a home to…
Home Sweet Home – Muhammed Mintullah, Hazrat Nizamuddin East
Dwellers in a posh neighbourhood. [Text and photo by Mayank Austen Soofi] The daughter of the last nawab of Rampur resides in this neighbourhood. Author Vikram Seth has an apartment here. A neighbouring flat belongs to former Jammu & Kashmir…
Home Sweet Home – Nizamuddin & Others, Jama Masjid
Housing on the pave. [Text and photos by Mayank Austen Soofi] They literally live in the shadow of the Jama Masjid. Right under the Mughal-era monument’s west-facing wall, towards which the attendees inside the mosque offer their prayers. This late…
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