DELHI BY HEART

by Raza Rumi

  This monument is also referred to as ‘Bhool Bhulaiyan,’ a labyrinth. The thick walls hide secret passages that are closed to ordinary mortals like me. Adam Khan was the son of Maham Anga, one of Emperor Akbar’s powerful wet nurses. When Adam murdered Ataga Khan, husband of Akbar’s other wet nurse, Ji Ji Anga, Akbar had Adam killed. A devastated Maham Anga also died later and the grief-struck (and perhaps, a little guilty too) Akbar raised this octagonal tomb for his foster mother and her unfortunate son. Ataga Khan, the lucky one, found a place in the Hazrat Nizamuddin complex and is buried close to the saint.

  The rocky and undulating hill spurs, covered with keekar and beri bushes, were also documented by the Delhi Gazetteer of 1874. It described how the soil sparkled with mica. One can still see, amid the smog, the ‘hills of Delhi’ ‘which, though not attractive in themselves, give a pleasant view across the Jamuna, and in clear weather, allows, it is said, even a glimpse of the Himalayas. The horizon is not as clear as suggested by British chroniclers. The wildlife of the region was also something to write home about—pigs, foxes, hare, partridge, duck, snipe, muggers, deer, black buck, snakes and crocodiles were plenty along the banks of the Jamuna; even leopards were seen at Tughlaqabad.

  The labyrinths of history make Mehrauli spectacularly haunting and prod me to explore more. I would need a lifetime. So I return to the monuments on a subsequent visit. Not alone this second time but with my permanent guide, Sadia Dehlvi, who is an accredited walking tour leader or a ‘heritage specialist’ as they say these days.

  Since 2000, the conservation effort of the Indian National Trust for Art and Cultural Heritage (INTACH) has done a remarkable job of enclosing and creating the Mehrauli Archaeological Park, and a unique park it is. There are numerous tombs, mosques and stepwells that are sometimes difficult to follow. We trace the path from the main entrance. This is a peaceful walkway dotted with keekar trees and babool shrubs that meander along the snaking track. There are large signs posted, appropriately enough, on red sandstone posts.

  Many families are here on this lazy Sunday morning, readying to picnic, almost unaware of where they are. Perhaps they will gobble up all the parathas and snacks in their lunchboxes first and then head towards the ruins, I joke with Sadia, who tells me off for being rude.

  We first come to the tomb of Ghiyasuddin Balban, the Sultan who ruled Delhi from 1265 to 1287. Getting to the tomb is a little arduous with all the bushes and rubble. But it is such a charming place with exquisite yet simple arches. ‘Sunil loves Geeta’ proclaimed a graffiti and then a little sketch showing a copulating couple. Ruins are an easy canvas to document sexual fantasies.

  Balban’s tomb, or whatever is left of it, was the resting place of the last Slave Sultan. Further, architecturally, this tomb displays the authentic Islamic arch—a first in India. Prior to this tomb, most buildings, including the screens around the Qutub Minar, had used corbelled arches. Corbelled arches were an indigenous form which was in vogue and were different from those of the Muslim world that had developed the art of radiating arches.

  Sadia shows me the gumti as we reach the path again. We reach a stream that flows into the undergrowth and bushes of oblivion. The path crosses the stream and leads you to one of the most impressive structures in the park, the sixteenth-century stepwell known as the Rajaon ki Baoli. One can see the adjacent mosque and tomb in the shimmering light of the afternoon. This rather grand stepwell was built in 1506 during the reign of Sikandar Lodhi (1489-1517). The baoli was built for the masons who worked on the monuments. Adequate water supply, living quarters and a mosque ensured that this was a fitting resthouse for the highly talented workers. The magnificent stepwell is five storeys deep with exquisitely pillared galleries on both sides and wide steps leading downwards.

  Another halt for us is the twelfth century Gandhak Baoli (sulfurous reservoir), which is the source of the stream we had passed by earlier. It is easy to miss this five-tiered baoli from the path as it rests below ground level. The narrow, sculpted pillars hold five galleries above the well and uncannily resemble the temple-like pillars of the Quwwat-ul-Islam mosque. Temple materials were also used here.

  Sadia is most keen for me to see the summer palace used by Delhi’s fabled British resident, Thomas Metcalfe. The latter had renovated old structures to create a boathouse and a dovecote in that sprawling grandiose space. There was a time when a man-made lake nestled here, but now the emptiness of the place, despite the enchanting ruins, is rather sad.

  We find the renovated tomb of Quli Khan. The octagonal building must have been stunning when it was constructed and adorned. Little wonder that Metcalfe made it into his summer palace which he called Dilkhush. Its architecture bears the imprint of the early Mughal style. But inside the tomb, which has lovely views on all sides, there is only graffiti vandalism. There is an attempt to erase it once in a while but the visitors are unsparing. Why should they care? After all, aren’t these only relics of those barbaric invaders who forced many of the natives to convert? I realize I am bitter in my reaction to the vandalism, so I look for other explanations. Perhaps they have no clue. Or maybe it is just that the present is far more important than a past buried in countervailing interpretations of history.

  Metcalfe’s house in the ASI Park known as Dilkhush, or Heart’s Delight, underwent some interesting innovations. The sarcophagus was replaced by a billiard table and the Mughal style was fused with Georgian gateways and adorned with follies. Not just that, as an English response to the nearby Zafar Mahal, Dilkhush had a lighthouse, a small fort, a pigeon house and a boating pond!

  I am completely astounded by the background of this structure. Sadia, the heritage diva, narrates the story to me in a piecemeal manner which is just the way I like it. The cacophony of trailing tour guides can be irritating sometimes. I have been told how upset Zeenat Aunty is with Sadia’s newfound passion. As an old Dilli-wali, reared in grandeur, she is appalled at her daughter becoming an ordinary ‘guide’. Sadia’s various attempts to enlighten her on the heritage industry have had little impact.

  We stand in the billiard room like ghosts and then we pass through the guest rooms and the kitchen area. His daughter Emily’s book, and the letters written by Sir Thomas indicate how delightful Dilkhush was to the eccentric sahib.

  Another of Metcalfe’s vital contributions to Delhi is the collage of sketches and images of monuments5 that he commissioned to an artist called Mazhar Khan. The collection with notes was presented to Emily. What a remarkable gift from a father that must have been!

  Before Sir Thomas, his elder brother, Charles Metcalfe, lived in Delhi when he started his assignment as assistant to the British Ambassador, Sir David Ochterlony, in 1806. Like his boss who adopted Indian ways, Charles Metcalfe created a house in the Shalimar Gardens in north Delhi and also found a native partner, a lady called Sikh Bibi whom he had met in Lahore. A pavilion and the bungalow which the senior Metcalfe had built still exist in the otherwise forlorn Shalimar Gardens.

  However, it was the younger Metcalfe who imbibed India to an unprecedented degree. Sir Thomas reached Delhi around 1812. While he remained very much a sahib and, unlike his elder brother, did not indulge in a harem-fest, he was to leave a lasting legacy of Raj life. Metcalfe smoked a silver hookah, built houses that displayed his deep aesthetic appreciation of Delhi’s architectural treasure trove, and perhaps, unwittingly, became the precursor of modern conservation strategies. Other than the Mehrauli house, he also built a residence called Jahan Numa (World Compass) along the river Jamuna. There were English style gardens, a library with 25,000 books and a formidable art collection.

  However, the events of 1857 pressed the more intolerant and arrogant British buttons making them more and more aggressive. Thus, the firangis changed their attitude towards India, Indians and Delhi. The Empire was formally extended and the natives had to be taught many lessons.

  The early years of post-1857 British rule were ruthless. Sir Thomas’s son, a magistrate then, indulged in butcher
y and was eventually removed from his assignment.

  The older Metcalfes and the youngest were all fashioned by their times and beliefs. Each one’s individual attitude represented the way the Raj officials traversed within the strange and exotic India, sometimes altering their initial mercenary and extractive worldviews. By the late nineteenth century, however, the predictable ‘white-man’s-burden’ belief was to assume a central position in the imperial discourse. Belittling ‘Mohammedans’ and their legacies, including their monuments, became a matter of paramount importance. The destruction of Shahjahanabad and Mehrauli after 1857 bears testimony to this fact.

  The sixteenth-century mosque and tomb of Jamali Kamali are the glory of the ASI Park in Mehrauli. The mosque with its central arch square is soulful and is a perfect place to spend one’s afternoon in seclusion. The fairly well-preserved tomb is perhaps the hidden jewel within the meandering folds of the ASI Park. The intricate patterns on its ceiling, painted in bright colours of blues and ochre, reflect the intimacy of the twin graves. The burly, smiling caretaker lets us in. His polite manner, given that he is an underpaid state employee doing what appears to be a boring job, is a surprise. The twin graves, Jamali and Kamali, friends and muses, are located next to each other.

  The construction of this monument began during the reign of Babur, the first Mughal Emperor. The Sultanate features are apparent in its design; however, the arch also heralds the advent of Persian influence via the new ruling class.

  Jamali was the nom de plume of the saint poet, Shaikh Fazlullah who lived through the reigns of Sikandar Lodhi, Babur, Sher Shah and Humayun. Kamali’s antecedents are blurred. Some say he was the beloved mentor of Jamali, but whatever be the case, the intimacy between the two is beyond the blurred lines of doubt. That they rest in peace under a magnificently painted ceiling with Indic, Turkic and Persian motifs implies that they were meant to be together even in death.

  The master-disciple closeness in Sufism or other mystical orders cannot be fully understood from the ‘outside.’ Rumi and Shams, Hazrat Nizamuddin and Khusrau, Sarmad and Abhay Chand, Jamali and Kamali, would appear as avant garde men of their times (as society did not take to them very kindly) for they expressed a particular same-sex intimacy, which may convey homoerotic undertones in contemporary studies of their relationships. However, be that as it may (or may not), it was also about arriving at the ‘common goal of divine love’ rather than just a pursuit of desires of the flesh. Today, these powerful, spiritual relationships are considered ‘hip’ and celebrated in various festivals.

  For many silent minutes, Sadia and I sit outside Jamali Kamali and imbibe the peace. Nearby, a small group of female labourers are carrying, rearranging and chiselling stones. Wearing tattered saris, they are quite oblivious to what the place is all about. They are from Madhya Pradesh and have come for work under the government’s employment generation scheme and earn hundred rupees a day. For a flash, the state of the ruins and the priorities of modern India make sense.

  Accidents in one’s mundane life can be dramatic. One such event was my getting to know the singer, Vidya Rao. Initially, this acquaintanceship was through the internet as she became a regular reader of my claptrap blogs. But in due course we crossed cyber lines to become real friends. And where does Vidya live? In Mehrauli with her adorably lazy and attention-hungry cat, Sufi. The white Sufi was found by Vidya at the Hazrat Nizamuddin dargah. As I discover, Vidya is also aware of the fondness of Prophet Mohammad for cats.

  Within months, I received books that she was editing for a publishing house as well as illustrations and CDs of her music. Another Delhi connection constructed with such joyous unpredictability and musicality.

  Vidya Rao is a performer of the delicate style of Thumri-Dadra singing. Endowed with a voice like that of a nightingale, she has been a disciple of the celebrated singer, the late Naina Devi. As I find out, Vidya later studied with Shanti Hiranand and the eminent Girja Devi. Her initial training in the more strictly classical Khayal style was under the late Prof B.N. Datta and thereafter under Pandit Mani Prasad. Thus, Vidya’s musical journey crisscrosses Delhi, for Khayal’s great-grand ancestors were the Sufi singers at Delhi shrines.

  Vidya also sings folk styles such as Kajri, Chaiti and Hori and dabbles in the Urdu ghazal. Not content with this endless list, she sings the devotional poetry of medieval Bhakti and Sufi saints, splashing her talents onto the elegiac Islamic terrains of Soz, Marsiya and Noha (performative styles that lament the martyrdom of Prophet Mohammad’s grandson and his family at Karbala), and praise-forms such as Naat (Urdu or Persian poetic eulogies for Prophet Mohammad). Ostensibly, these are ‘Muslim’ forms as one would note in the contested climes of our world, but Vidya’s vision and talents cross these lines. A renaissance woman, Vidya collaborates with other musicians as well as artistes from other disciplines such as painters, writers and theatre persons, to create innovative works.

  It is from Vidya that I learnt about the indigenous eulogies for Prophet Mohammad, once popular in Uttar Pradesh and which are delightfully syncretic and earthy—‘Tore gumbad ki hariyali ho, to pyaas bujhe in nainan ki’ (‘The greenness of your tomb O Prophet, will quench the thirst of my eyes’). Today in Medina, Muslims are forbidden to touch and celebrate their proximity to Mohammad’s tomb as it is considered to be irreligious according to the tenet of Wahabi Islam. South Asian Muslims remain a different creed despite the growing influence of Wahabi ideology through petro dollars and the Pakistani state’s strategic alliances with Saudi Arabia.

  When we meet in her cozy Mehrauli apartment, with the view of the Qutub complex almost like a painting in her living room, Vidya tells me, ‘Poets, artists, singers, dancers, mystics, ordinary men and women have, over the centuries, filled in the stitches of this beautiful fabric of my culture. Like Kabir I take it in my hands and sing how the tapestry created over centuries, torn as it may be, defines me and protects me.’

  Vidya and I sit there and talk about her recent work with a team that is producing short films on Kabir’s poetry and music while Sufi the cat, feeling neglected, snoozes on a large red cushion. She also tells me that, in addition to Sufism, Buddhism appeals to her. Each year, Vidya spends several days in a monastery hidden somewhere in the Himalayas. Her music is the vehicle of her inner search and her spirituality her strength.

  In those memorable conversations that took place in Delhi’s freezing December or crispy spring, Vidya inspired me with her ‘belongingness’ and pride in an inclusive culture. She wrote to me once:

  There is an extraordinary good fortune that is mine, to be born here—woman, singer, Indian, to be heir to this shimmering tapestry that is my history and my culture. Where else but here, how else but being born who I am, could I claim as my birthright the songs of the Qawwals of the dargah of Hazrat Moinuddin Chishti and Hazrat Nizammudin Aulia, the chanting of hymns at Kashi Vishvanath, the silence of Sarnath, the heat of the rocks on Arunachala Hill, the icy cold of Himalayan snow, the blue of the western sea and the sentinel boulders of the Deccan?

  Intrigued as a Pakistani by a Hindu woman singing Muslim devotional poetry and songs, Vidya further surprised me:

  Where else could I claim the right to speak in a hundred languages, all mine, all deeply loved? Where else worship in a thousand different ways, where thrill to the touch of the charming Kanha, where lose myself in the complex metaphysics of Nalanda, where weep and mourn the martyrs of Karbala? Where else could I rejoice to see the flames of the blooming tesu and semal, and the lace of kachnar blossoms, where fill my lungs with the scent of re-born rain-washed earth?

  After our first meeting, at Sadia’s dinner party, Vidya transformed everyone’s mood with her thumris, including the one by the late Begum Akhtar in a concert in Pakistan, lamenting her separation from her beloved and then reconciling with it by finding a meaning in it. Vidya’s repertoire is vast and intense and I dare say, a bit eccentric. What a sensation she would be if she were to visit Pakistan and sing in Lahore and Karac
hi, that is, if the visa regime was not so tragically myopic. In Delhi we make fanciful plans only to forget them soon.

  Over the years, Vidya has also started to contribute to my blog, to comment on various posts, bringing a capacious depth marked with music and philosophy, silence and meditation, to my musings in cyberspace. So keeping in touch is now an effortless game.

  One day, at the Café Turtle in Khan Market, Vidya also introduced me to Shubha Mudgal, another well-known musician. Shubha is a cheerful and friendly person devoid of the self-important nonsense that stars are usually known for. Her collaboration with Pakistani artist, Salman Ahmed of the band Junoon, was a hit a few years ago. Based on the ancient Sufi rhythm of ghoom tana, symbolizing the divine wheel that weaves life, it was a celebration of the borderless-ness of music and the inseparable-ness of the musical heritage of India and Pakistan. This explains why, despite official and state posturing, Bollywood music is such a rage in both Pakistan and Bangladesh, not to mention classical music.

  5

  Earth’s Music

  R

  aj Kumar Hardev, a prince of Deogarh a principality located in the Deccan in southern India, was an eccentric character. He came to meet Hazrat Nizamuddin Auliya, and ended up staying at his khanqah for years, eventually converting to Islam. He rose to occupy the powerful position of prime minister under Mohammad Shah Tughlaq, whose daughter he had married during his stay in Delhi. He lost his life in the labyrinths of intrigue that characterized Delhi courts in those days. But his legacy for succeeding generations is his memoir, Chahal Roza.1