Skip to main content

Delhi


Delhi is a city of flyovers and high-fliers.  People from all over the country are driven to the welter of opportunities that the National Capital Region offers with the magnanimity that the emperors of the walled city displayed to their favourite courtiers and courtesans.  Anyone who has the inclination and the drive will find his or her place in Delhi sooner than later – under the flyover if not above it. 

Sprawling landscape around Qutub Minar
The loves we share with a city are often not very upfront.  What drives Delhi are not merely the well-maintained roads and flyovers and the exquisite metro service but also the secret gratifications it offers in the sprawling malls with their multiplexes and the greenery that throbs in the woodlands that dot the city’s map with an unusual excess of nature’s bounty.  You can drive a dilapidated Bajaj scooter or a luxurious BMW and be at home in the anonymity of Delhi’s crowded vastness.  You can wear a cheap outfit bought from the street vendor in Chandni Chowk or a royal dress from DLF Emporio in Vasant Kunj and be a proud Delhiite.

Delhi has a unique design.  There is the old city of Shahjahan with its limestone and marbles, walls and tombs, that carry breathtaking tales with the patience that only stones possess.  Then there is the New Delhi that stretches seemingly endlessly into the neighbouring states. 
An ashram in Bhatti Mines

The metro trains that run in the sky with skyscrapers of all shapes and sizes silhouetted all  around lend a distinctive flavour to Delhi.  The cycle rickshaws still linger on in Shahjahan’s city where life teems with primitive passion in contrast with the luxury of the sophistication that one encounters in South Delhi.

There is a whole world beneath the surface of Delhi.  It’s not only the underground markets like Palika Bazaar or the underground metro rails that draw you to the entrails of the city.  There is a whole network of subways some of which are more crowded than the overground thoroughfares.  Some of the miracles of human imagination and invention can be found in those underground worlds.  The Rajiv Chowk metro station is one such miracle with a whole underground universe that teems with thousands of people at any given time when the metro trains are in service. 

The best thing may be that Delhi connects.  There are people who will help you to make the connections.  Whatever kind of connections you may wish for.  There are the services.  There are the facilities.  There are the transport systems: from the humble cycle rickshaws in the walled city’s congested lanes with their royal arches of yore to the innumerable flights that take off from the various terminals of Indira Gandhi airport.  And there is an abundance of godmen and their ashrams.  Hundreds of vehicles of all types, mostly of the richer varieties, ply towards these homes of holiness particularly in South Delhi on days when the godmen deign to shower their blessings on the yearning teeming devotees.  What is a city without some spiritual connects?  Delhi has some inimitable godmen especially in Bhatti Mines.  The very air of Bhatti Mines is redolent of the heavens.  

PS. This post is written for the #madeofgreat theme of Tata Motors:

Comments

  1. Activities like musical performances by the bands of police and paramilitary forces at Dilli Haats, traditional welcome of tourists at Delhi Tourism information counters, will be the highlight of the day.

    thesis writing service

    ReplyDelete

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

The Adventures of Toto as a comic strip

  'The Adventures of Toto' is an amusing story by Ruskin Bond. It is prescribed as a lesson in CBSE's English course for class 9. Maggie asked her students to do a project on some of the lessons and Femi George's work is what I would like to present here. Femi converted the story into a beautiful comic strip. Her work will speak for itself and let me present it below.  Femi George Student of Carmel Public School, Vazhakulam, Kerala Similar post: The Little Girl

The Little Girl

The Little Girl is a short story by Katherine Mansfield given in the class 9 English course of NCERT. Maggie gave an assignment to her students based on the story and one of her students, Athena Baby Sabu, presented a brilliant job. She converted the story into a delightful comic strip. Mansfield tells the story of Kezia who is the eponymous little girl. Kezia is scared of her father who wields a lot of control on the entire family. She is punished severely for an unwitting mistake which makes her even more scared of her father. Her grandmother is fond of her and is her emotional succour. The grandmother is away from home one day with Kezia's mother who is hospitalised. Kezia gets her usual nightmare and is terrified. There is no one at home to console her except her father from whom she does not expect any consolation. But the father rises to the occasion and lets the little girl sleep beside him that night. She rests her head on her father's chest and can feel his heart...

War and Meaning of Victory

In the summer of 1999, while the rest of India was soaked in monsoon and Cricket World Cup, the country’s soldiers were clawing up frozen cliffs daring the bullets that came shooting from above. India’s incorrigible neighbour had sent its soldiers and militants to capture the snow-covered peaks of Kargil. It was an act of deception, a capture of India’s land stealthily. The terrain was harsh and hostile, testing the limits of human courage with every jagged step. The Kargil War was not just against a human enemy, but against peaks of stones and snow where the air itself was an adversary. Three months of bitter conflict and subhuman killing ended in India’s victory over the invading Pakistan. Victory! July 26 is celebrated ever after as Kargil Vijay Diwas by India. What is victory, however? Philosophically, I mean. We are supposed to be rational (philosophical) creatures, after all. “ W ar does not determine who is right,” Bertrand Russell said famously, “but who is left.” Every...

Stories from the North-East

Book Review Title: Lapbah: Stories from the North-East (2 volumes) Editors: Kynpham Sing Nongkynrih & Rimi Nath Publisher: Penguin Random House India 2025 Pages: 366 + 358   Nestled among the eastern Himalayas and some breathtakingly charming valleys, the Northeastern region of India is home to hundreds of indigenous communities, each with distinct traditions, attire, music, and festivals. Languages spoken range from Tibeto-Burman and Austroasiatic tongues to Indo-Aryan dialects, reflecting centuries of migration and interaction. Tribal matrilineal societies thrive in Meghalaya, while Nagaland and Mizoram showcase rich Christian tribal traditions. Manipur is famed for classical dance and martial arts, and Tripura and Arunachal Pradesh add further layers of ethnic plurality and ecological richness. Sikkim blends Buddhist heritage with mountainous serenity, and Assam is known for its tea gardens and vibrant Vaishnavite culture. Collectively, the Northeast is a uni...

The RSS and Paradoxes

The oldest racist organisation in the world is all set to celebrate the centenary of its existence. The Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) was founded in 1925 with the specific goal of unifying the Hindus in India under a religious and cultural banner. The Indian Independence struggle that was going on in full force at that time was no concern of the RSS. Though it gave the liberty to its individual members to take part in the struggle, the organisation’s official policy was to stay clear of it altogether. That was only one of the many paradoxical ironies that marked the RSS which was a nationalist organisation that cared little for the Independence of the nation. Today, the Prime Minister of India is a man who was trained and nurtured by the RSS. Shashi Tharoor wrote a massive book on the paradoxes that underscore the personality of Mr Narendra Modi. The RSS and paradoxes go hand in hand, if we take Modi as a specimen of the organisation’s great achievements. Tharoor’s final asses...