The Walled City encyclopaedia.

[Text and photo by Mayank Austen Soofi]

What do we call those pellets packed inside firearms? Oh yes, the charra! And here in Old Delhi, a street is named Gali Charre Wali.

Worry not, the gali is said to be free of guns. Indeed, the little-known lane is currently so much at peace, so quiet, that it is difficult to comprehend that it lies close to the chaotic ‘hoods of Baradari and Ballimaran’.

This evening, beneath a tangle of cables, two friendly Charre Wali dwellers (see photo) are standing at the mouth of the street, inadvertently blocking the access to the cramped passage ahead. Electrician Zaki is 75. Ali, a marketeer, is 34. The older gent identifies the gali’s current silence as its consistent characteristic. He recalls his days as a child. This gali would be cloaked in an even more absolute silence, for very few families lived in the street back then. Outsiders would be scared to enter, he says, overwhelmed by the desolation.

The younger Ali, the marketeer, is staying silent, perhaps out of reverence to his elder. Speaking slowly and softly, the venerable Zaki remarks that “long ago, when our grandfathers were still waiting to be born, charre would be manufactured in this gali.” Today, he says, the lane consists entirely of residences, except for a mosque, and for the 60-year-old Shafiq Sweet Corner (tasty bread pakodas!)

The marketeer finally speaks. He points out that the “charre” in the gali’s name could as well have referred to ball bearings that are widely used in machines (and not in guns).

The two men now squeeze back to let the visitor enter the narrow gali.

Wading deep into the dimly lit street brings one to an exquisitely beautiful doorway. The door panels are dense with floral motifs, capped by a niched taak. Actually, this old-fashioned darwaza isn’t much different from its similarly aged cousins elsewhere in the Walled City. But the lane’s darkened ambiance has lent the doorway a mood of mystery and melancholy.

The street has only one turning, after which it ends into a multi-storey. The marble plaque on the grey facade bears the building’s unusual name. The word is not in Hindi or Urdu, as typical of the area, but in English — Radiance. However, the only thing radiant at the moment is not exclusive to the street. Pitch white and almost wholly round, it is the moon rising above.