The Walled City dictionary.

[Text and photo by Mayank Austen Soofi]

Old Delhi’s Gali Choori Wallan no longer has any choori shop, or choori worker. So why should you today expect Old Delhi’s Gali Lohe Wali to have anything to do with loha, or iron?

In fact, the lane near Chawri Bazar exposes an altogether different character than you would expect from its name. It is lined with stores selling… wedding cards!

This afternoon, as the weak November sunshine tries to penetrate through the winter smog, the street walls deepen the grim mood with their dust-covered smears of peeling paint. A rotting genda garland is strung around a wall flyer advertising the services of a “shutter repairer.” A kati patang is stuck behind a pole. An old door is lying latched and locked (see photo). The gap between the panes of the door reveals a roofless enclosure within, open to the sky.

The long street is otherwise utterly quiet, although crowded with labourers. Many of the men are carrying massive stacks of cards on their head. A few labourers are resting on parked carts, gazing at their mobile screens.

Some steps ahead, scores of strange-looking slatted wooden sheets are arranged neatly outside a shuttered store. “That’s pattha,” shouts a passer-by. He explains that pattha is used by labourers to carry “shaadi card ke gatthi” on their head. The centre of each pattha is fitted with a padded cap-like thing called kundi, which is a protective cover to “keep the labourer’s head cushioned from the pressure of his load.”

The street’s most renowned landmark happens to be a culinary establishment. “We are more than a hundred years old,“ mutters the man at Heera Lal Chaat Corner. The wall behind him bears a black & white portrait of founder Heera Lal. Two foreign tourists, accompanied by a guide, are trying the eatery’s famous kulle chaat.

The street’s other renowned figure happens to be freedom fighter Devaki Nandan Gupta. More than a full decade before the independence, he staged a protest at one Bhola Ram’s liquor shop against the sale of liquor. It was not really about the liquor, but about defying the colonial government. He spent six months in the jails of Delhi and Lahore.

Today, the site where Devaki Nandan Gupta lived comprises of a multi-storey, fronted by a series of blue doors. One door is ajar. The courtyard inside is deserted.

PS: Photo shows citizen Shaukat, a labourer