Delhi - The End

There is no start or end to this post. In fact these days I have stopped bothering about that. Call it the summer effect or re-realisation but now I’m immune to most of the things. I don’t care if I’m not an ace writer, a good employee, a good friend or whatever. Perhaps this is the only best part of being ‘unsuccessful’.
Anyhow, last night, which was Saturday, I went to a happening discotheque of the city. Thanks to my journalist friend, everything was on the house. I did not want to go home last night and this offer of free drinks was a better option if not an irresistible one. But yes, once I sipped on the ice-cold vodka I was back in my zone, away from the partying crowd and suddenly I realised that perhaps this was the best time to say farewell to Delhi………….


‘Capitol’ can be a worth visiting place for some. I’m sure it depends on your company and your mood. And perhaps that stands true for all discotheques in the world. Anyhow, this place was as urban as Madison Square. Everybody was trying to live the moment.
The place was crowded with Greek gods and goddesses. Skimpy skirts showing well waxed long legs and men wearing t-shirts that displayed their well toned muscles. Lots of Aunties, who had put enough mascara to hide their now prominent wrinkles and also their husbands as well, blissfully unaware that their husbands are busy ogling at the younger ladies than worrying about their wives. I laughed at this irony and gulped another of my screwdrivers.

This drink was the one that made me start thinking about Delhi. The DJ started playing some peppy numbers and the crowd was on its feet. I was wondering if Delhi would have been around, what would be her reaction. While I was pondering over this, a couple next to me started dancing sensuously. I looked at them and smiled; they frowned and went back to their normal steps.
I went to the bar and asked for another drink. Nearby an auntie was prompting her husband to hit the floor. She must be around 40 and I’m sure her husband would have lost the zest a year or two ago. But the auntie was adamant and she turned into Shakira. I lit a cigarette and started watching her. Another glass down and then the vision hazed.

I started looking for Delhi. I don’t know how she dances or if she likes partying. But I’m sure she is good with her moves. I wish I can dance along with her, slow, rhythmic and sensuous. Alas, the moment I realised that this will always be a dream, my vision got cleared. By now the auntie was also tired and now demanding her husband to let her smoke. Smoke! I laughed at her and extinguished mine.
There were guys who were trying their best to impress girls and perhaps hook on with aunties at least. Now since I’m under no such illusion I preferred watching. Fake conversations, phoney smiles, unnecessary hugs were served as fast as drinks. I preferred sticking to Vodka. Repeat the order, please.

Another sip and Delhi resurfaced in my thoughts. The song was about the eyes of a girl and nobody can beat my Delhi on that. Sorry. Not my Delhi. Delhi only Delhi. I tried to place Delhi with all good looking men whom she may have chosen. There were many and I know Delhi may go with someone someday. I gulped this one in rage. Jealousy. Why? I’m sure may Delhi go with someone and be she happy with him but nobody can love her more than me and when I reasoned this the anger faded away.

Another good number and I decided to shake my leg. After all I was here for partying. A girl tapped my shoulder. I was taken aback. But her hands indicated what she wanted. A matchbox. I lit the cigarette for her. We got into a short conversation. Her ‘thanks’ came with a small peck on cheeks. Not Bad I thought. Let’s go and ask every lady if she wants me to light her cigarette. But the waiter had other plans. He saw my glass empty and brought another one. I feared to lose the count and decided this is the last one.
In the corner a couple were fighting with their tongues. The girl was a bit hesitant I guess but the boy was all for it. I did not smile this time. I was afraid of being bashed. I just sipped on my drink.

I don’t understand why alcohol and Delhi comes together. I guess I’ve to leave both. Here one sip down the throat and Delhi is standing before me smiling. This time I stared back at her. She too didn’t say anything. We kept looking at each other for sometime and then it dawned. I was always looking for Delhi in history, monuments, dreams and so on….but Delhi she is life and life does not reside in these places, life moves on and so did Delhi.
I saw her taking the stairs. She didn’t even turn back. I know she will not. I know she is not wrong. I know this is the truth. But I also know if she would have been with me I wouldn’t have been in Capitol, I would have been in a garden asking her to read me a book while tasting some wine…….

So as I said there is no start or end to it. Delhi deserved a practical farewell and Capitol was the best place to do so and not the ramparts of Red Fort. But I’ll go to Red Fort to find my Delhi and I’ve no regrets in being ‘unsuccessful’ to do so….

Delhi- IV

I don't know but I've finally decided to call it a day. Reason, I have no clues. Perhaps somewhere I don't want to do it and in a way I'm forcing myself but I have to. As a loser I don't stand a chance and for what and why? This is extremely boring and this makes me feel sad. I guess I'm slowly dying. But the problem is I've felt so a thousand times before and still I'm very much alive. Perhaps when you ask for it you don't get it and when it comes you try to resist it. How unsuccessful!

Some days ago, I went to Jama Masjid. It was Eid. I don't like to believe in god. But the place reminds me of him. The tall minarets, the vast courtyard and the simplicity within this grandeur. This makes me feel both small and big. I look for Delhi. I yearn for her. But I couldn't find her anymore and her smell is also missing. I become lonely in the crowd. Like a lost kid….

Inside Jama Masjid, there is a small pond, where people wash their feet before saying prayers. I think the process is called ablution. The water washes away your sins before you ask for oneness with god. And before you enter the main hall, there is a beautifully carved marble gate. You have to go beneath it so as to enter the main hall. It is so designed that an adult has to bend while passing through it. Smart attempt I must say. Even in those times the king had to shed his supremacy before entering. The moment the king bends, the supremacy of god is accepted.
The whole idea makes me laugh. I mean we humans make a building which compete with the skies, only to realise we cannot defeat god and then we make sure that we itself say that. Perhaps the same is with Delhi and me. I try to compete with her only to realise that I can't win and then I accept my defeat. If it is to be so then let it be that way. Neither she can take anything away from me nor I can give her anything. But then in all honesty, if this is so then it is true love. And Delhi, she does not believe in love she encourage admirers. She is a candle who attract moths and the fate of moths…..unsuccessfulness?

From Jama Masjid, my newfound friend and me traversed to Chawri bazzar. It is said that this was where the lust of Delhi once lived. Lust of Delhi? I wonder. Delhi does not lust she lures. And whenever Delhi lusted it turned out to be a blunder. There are various examples. Be it before mutiny or after independence, whenever Delhi felt for his ruler, they vanquished and Delhi she was devastated at this loss. Now that she has learnt her lessons, she plays and Oh! She plays it well. Anyhow Chawri Bazzar has changed over centuries. I cannot visualize those lovely ladies standing in the balconies trying to lure passers-by. I tried hard but of no avail. I tried to see Delhi again but she wasn't anywhere. Somewhere I wanted to blame it on my newfound friend but then I realised I have lost it. Chawri Bazzar looked like a market filled of shops and rickshaws. A reality that I hate to see, hear and admit.

This self incised wound refuses to heal up. Delhi is lost and it now lives in the book of history. I don't know but back there in Jama Masjid, a Sikh man who brought her daughter was telling her little one that there is nothing great about here. His daughter may have read about Jama Masjid in some history book and insisted to see the place. Holding the little girl's arm he said, "See it is just a vast open space. There is nothing here to see." Little he saw the fascinated look at his daughter's face. She was fascinated by what I am in love with. And her father, he will not understand it, nor will others.

And then from nowhere, I saw Delhi, at the other end, just below the moon. She was looking mesmerising. I tried to call her but my voice was choked. I turned and looked at the little girls face; she was also looking there, as if trying to memorize this grandeur. A kid and a lover, both lost for one thing. Who's unsuccessful? Me, the kid or Delhi? Whatever be the answer one thing is sure that Delhi continues to live, if not with me then with others…..successfully I wish.

Delhi- III

Everyone says/believe that once you are in a relationship, eventually the thrill of being in it takes a nosedive, it becomes monotonous, dreary and then the future is – a painful parting. But what about people like me for whom in spite of whatever time you spend the rendezvous seems short-lived. So my amour with Delhi goes on……(for what is painful, is being unsuccessful and I’m doomed to be so).


Mehrauli
A post is not enough to write about it and a day seems too short to explore the place. But I tried the later and am now trying the first.

The ruins of Mehrauli showcases the childhood of Delhi and after the visit I have no shame in saying that I won’t mind being called a paedophile. Once Mehrauli was Delhi, won by Ghori from Prithviraj Chauhan. Then she was a child, young in years but old in wisdom. As years passed by, the Slave dynasty rulers nursed it, later caressed by the Lodhis, and finally Delhi blossomed in the Mughal era.


Today only the ruins speak of the past glory of Mehrauli. They are very much there, facing weather, negligence, encroachment and everything else. What makes them survive? Love. I don’t think so. Delhi does not love anyone. I have asked her a hundred times and she maintains a deafening silence. Now I’ve stopped asking that. The rendezvous of these monuments has been going on for the past few centuries and it seems the thrill is very much there. And that leaves me mesmerised.


Qutub Minar

Aibak wanted to make a mark on this city. He wanted to show the world that he has won her. What else can a man do to show that he possesses a woman? He erected a stone phallus. 14.32 metre long with 379 steps. But Delhi has her own way to treat idiots like him. The man who relished his daughter completed his grand monument. Aibak died while playing chaughan (medieval polo) and his son-in-law, the next king completed the structure. Some say that it was for the revered saint Qutubbdin Bakhtiyar Kaki, whose hospice is just a stone throw away. Some centuries later, Firuz Tughlaq added an another floor to it.

Another moron, Allaudin Khilji tried to outdo Iltutmish. He had grandiose plans of constructing another phallus, twice the length of Qutub Minar. All his life, in his attempt to be fair, he was cruel to my city. Delhi does not like such characters. His dream was nipped in the bud. Today ‘Alai Minar’ looks like a small wrinkled penis. Only the first floor was completed and he died. I am surprised, why Delhi gives herself to such blockheads and professes her love. She is unfair to me but then that’s the way it is.

Then there is the Quwwatul-Islam mosque. It has been constructed over what was once a Jain temple. Even today in the pillars you can see Hindu gods, whose images have been desecrated by cutting of their nose and so. Does that mean Delhi was vanquished? I looked at her, like always her lips are curved. I cannot make out if this is a smile or a face representing pain. It is like someone has done something, a relationship got broken – a parting. But she will not tell me, for her I’m just one of her admirers.

Dargah Qutubbdin Bakhtiyar Kaki

Like all religious places this dargah has also fallen prey to business. From the entrance till the mazaar, you will find people selling flowers, namazi topis (caps), symbols of Islam and another strange set asking for donations. The beggars will follow you till the end of road. If you meet an old man waving a big cloth fan don’t forget to give him a rupee or two, among all he seems the most deserving case.

Jahaaz Mahal

It is said that the last Mughal king Bhaduar Shah Zafar used to come here and write poetry. It is also said that the lake use to touch the palace and there was an open court in the middle of that there was a small pool in which the lake water use to come. In times of monsoon, it sometimes overflowed. Today the lake looks more like a sewer. I don’t know but the state in which this place is explains that in what state of penury the last king was living. Of all what I saw here was some old people playing Chopar (an old ludo sort of game). Somehow the old guys reminded of Zafar. Toothless, gumless but nevertheless enjoying. Basking in the glory of their past.

I think, I would die like Zafar. Delhi will treat me the same way. I will be exiled to a foreign land where no one will know me. But then back at the mazaar of Bakhtiyar Kaki, I saw an another mazaar of Hzt. Sheikh Aziz Bistani for which Kaki bought land from his own meagre savings. I think I deserve that. Like Lak Baksh (Aibak) I will not die in her arms, like Zafar I will not be separated from her. May whatever comes, I’ll be there, buried in her soul, continuing my rendezvous…..unsuccessfully.

Delhi- II

Once again, like always, I’ve been successful to become Unsuccessful. But this time, I’m regretful for my regrets. For the past few days I was enjoying something which didn’t make me happy and today I’ve nothing to enjoy but I’m happy.

The Tomb -

It is no less than a fort but it is a graveyard, where buried memories are living with history, protected from time. Memories and History, they both are inseparable, like Delhi and me. Those who are buried here also thought the same. Delhi laughs! I can hear her voice; she is amused at my thought. I visualise the curve of her lips and smile. We both know.


Like other graveyards, this place doesn’t makes you sad. There is something in the grandiose tomb, which is surrounded by lush gardens, that makes you think. May be, it is the place itself, so vast, so quiet that for once you forget all your sorrow, aspirations and perhaps realise the presence of god (if there is any), in my case, the understanding of unsuccessfulness gets more clearer.

The graveyard itself questions – Is death a mark of unsuccessfulness, is it an attempt to be in the annals of history, an unsuccessful attempt to remain in this mortal world. I look for Delhi. The wind is quiet, I guess she agrees with me. She knows I’m an emotional fool so she wears the drape of silence. I understand.




Humayun and me have two things in common. He loved Delhi and I do. He was unsuccessful to enjoy her true beauty and I am destined to be so. There are two differences as well – He won Delhi, I submitted to her. He lost Delhi and I never owned her. Delhi, she is standing behind me…….smirking!

Humayun lost Delhi twice, some historians’ say that he was an opium addict. I think otherwise. If he had been so he would have never come back. There is something strange in Delhi.
To someone who doesn’t know her, she would appear like a whore, she is the queen of whosoever wins her. But for her true lovers she is an addiction. An addiction that made Humayun risk his life, an addiction that I am trying to resist.

Some may give names to my Delhi, I don’t mind, Delhi also doesn’t mind swear words, they are a part of her culture. They always were. I close my eyes and I see her, she is not looking at me. She is lost perhaps thinking of Humayun and of her other admirers. I get jealous for a second but realise the futility, nah, perhaps unsuccessfulness, but of whom, mine or hers?


The tomb has two minarets that try to kiss the sky. The white dome spells peace. There are graves all around. It is said that Humayun died when he stumbled on the stairs of his library. He was in a hurry to answer the prayer’s call.

To reach the main dome, you have to go through the Bu Halima and the Arab serai gate. Before you reach them one may have a look at the carpet of bats spread on the stairs of Isa Khan tomb. But if you are game enough and decide to walk upstairs, there is a wonderful view to enjoy.

I was with my friend to whom I owe special thanks. With her I am myself. No pretensions and no expectations. Without her, I would have never been here. As we two friends walk out of this place, we promise to come again.

A promise, like the one Humayun made, the one which Monsoon did, a promise which I fancy to make. Delhi, she never promises anything. It is not her fault. She is not to blame because she is genuine. It is her nature. She never deserts but she is never yours.

She is an enigma and to make her yours is just like building a tomb. An unsuccessful attempt to maintain your presence in this mortal world. Humayun, he died in her arms. I will not, I plan to remain unsuccessful……..

Delhi- I

I am at crossroads, and there is nothing new about it. Being Unsuccessful is not easy, it is to be - consistently at crossroads, choosing the right path and then falter. Anyhow, I have no qualms about it. “I am too involved in negative that I have not arrived at the positive yet.”.

Delhi and I share a unique relationship. I am one of her zillion inhabitants and I think I am in love with her. I know this relationship is short-lived. It’s a matter of few weeks after which, we will be apart. I am determined to make this sojourn, a memorable one. I don’t know, what I love about her the most, perhaps her aloofness. Was she always like this, or is it a special treatment melted out to me? I don’t know and I don’t care. Delhi bewitches me. She makes me think. She comes near, just to retrace. She is always there and she is nowhere. She makes me feel special and than she makes it clear, I am just one of those zillions. But we share one thing; her history and my present speaks for it. We both are unsuccessful. I guess that’s why I love Delhi.

Today Z came. Like always our conversation travelled around the world. Z is always a big support and over alcohol he becomes a necessity. I always wonder what binds me to him, he says it’s Trust. He tells – The first thing that makes two people click is physique, the second is money but what makes them stick together is Trust. Talking about trust over whisky is funny. He lighted a cigarette for me, while I was gazing the navel of a chubby female, he said, as if mediating – You can’t buy trust. I don’t know. It seems too complicated, just like figuring the navel of that female. Trust, can I order some of it, or perhaps they give it free – one plus one, like all other drinks. Happy hours, last order till 8 P.M. I settle for gin and Z for his whisky. Delhi is still around, in that gin as well, smiling at me. I gulp it quick.

Yesterday, I visited Safdurjung Tomb and a Christian Cemetery at PrithviRaj Road. One stands for history, another for present. Safdurjung got acres to get buried and back there in cemetery, they charge a ransom for your grave. On top of that people have started burying, their dear ones over their near ones. Reason shortage of space. So Martha has Samuel on her top and James have Syria. So now it reads, For James and Syria, one departed in 1989 and another got late by 6 years. It’s is being unfair but I don’t expect anything else from Delhi. She gives everything to some and nothing to others. For me, like always she disappoints me.

Safdurjung Tomb is as big as the heart of my friend who went along with me. Both have hidden secrets. I tried to find none, only enjoyed the vastness. There were beehives hanging from the tomb and there was honey in her voice. We sat at the stairs, gazing the gardens, talking about history, present and future. The peacocks announced our arrival and the squirrels danced. I relished it. On our way out, when my friend was talking to someone on her phone, I turned back. Delhi was there, at the steps, where I sat a few moments ago, she was smiling, waving me goodbye. I hastened my steps.

Delhi Haat was the next stop. Stalls of all states. What they represent, Indianness? Whatever, cold coffee and fruit beer was enough to beat the heat. The moment we finished, what we ordered, they shut down the fan!! We talked like kids. Innocence comes at price, we both knew and are fierce enough to protect that. As we were leaving, Delhi, brushed past me. I was startled. She turned back and winked. I closed my eyes.


As I am concluding this piece, sitting in front of a computer, in a basement. I know Delhi is still around. She is cruel. She is a bad correspondent. I know, I can’t escape. But as I said, I am at crossroads and I am unsuccessful’.