City Monument – CP’s White Columns Part 3, Connaught Place Hangouts Landmarks by The Delhi Walla - October 3, 20250 On a colonial-era legacy. [Text and photo by Mayank Austen Soofi] Sure, this is easier than counting the stars. But still, it is something—to manually count the columns of Delhi’s iconic Connaught Place (CP). The white colonial-era columns constitute CP’s signature persona. They support the ceilings of its many colonnades. Identical in shape and height, the stately columns line the market arcades of the Inner and Outer Circles, as well as the corridors that link the two circles. Last to last week, the first part of this series conducted a count of the Outer Circle columns. Last week was the turn of Inner Circle columns. This week, the concluding agenda is to count the columns of CP’s intervening corridors that link the Inner and
City Faith – Sheetala Maa Temple, Chirag Dehli Faith Landmarks by The Delhi Walla - October 1, 20250 A neighbourhood shrine. [Text and photo by Mayank Austen Soofi] A veggie seller is dragging his cart along the lane. He stops on reaching a tiraha trisection, turns towards a corner temple, reverently joining his palm into a posture of prayer—see photo. The historic Chirag Dehli village is well-known for its centuries-old Sufi dargah of Hazrat Chirag Nasiruddin Roshan Dehlavi—the saint gives his name to the village. But the south Delhi neighbourhood harbours also other points of pilgrimage. Just outside the village’s gateway rises the tall spire of Shiv Mandir. A short distance within the gateway is the aforementioned temple of “Maa Sheetala.” This is the shrine of a goddess who is said to ward off small pox, as well as other
City Monument – CP’s White Columns Part 2, Connaught Place Hangouts Landmarks by The Delhi Walla - September 25, 2025September 25, 20250 On a colonial-era legacy. [Text and photo by Mayank Austen Soofi] Here’s a thing to mull upon. If all the columns of Delhi’s Connaught Place (CP) are pulled out from their foundation, and installed one upon another, could they then reach the altitude of Mount Everest? The stately white colonial-era columns constitute CP’s signature sight. They support the ceilings of its colonnades, rooting them to the good earth. Identical in their circular shape and height, the columns line the market arcades of the Inner and Outer Circles, as well as the corridors that link the circles. Last week, the first part of this series conducted a survey of the Outer Circle columns. Today’s the turn of the Inner Circle columns. The following observations culled
City Landmark – Sunder Nursery, Near Humayun Tomb Hangouts Landmarks Nature by The Delhi Walla - August 4, 20250 Park by numbers. [Text and photo by Mayank Austen Soofi] 5 million. This is the number of footfalls Sunder Nursery has accumulated since the day it opened to us Delhiwale six years ago—according to Aga Khan Trust for Culture that created and now manages the park. The milestone was reached late last month. High time to statistically dissect a destination whose many gardens and monuments have become the capital’s capital refuge. 01/12/2018 Date of the park’s opening. 15,000 Total number of park trees. 300 is the number of tree species. 10 of these are so unique to the park—such as Brazilian Ironwood and Satin Leaf— that you won’t see them anywhere else in India. (Why so? Wait for a forthcoming dispatch!) 177 Number of benches in the park.
City Landmark – Minto Bridge, Connaught Place Landmarks by The Delhi Walla - August 1, 20250 Viceroy Minto's memorial. [Text and photo by Mayank Austen Soofi] The blue sky is smudged with puffs of clouds, and with dozens of birds. This scene is painted across the underpass ceiling. Originally named after a British viceroy, Minto Bridge rail underpass links Connaught Place to New Delhi railway station—and beyond to GB Road red light district in the Walled City. Although rechristened after Shivaji, most Delhiwale continues to call it Minto Bridge. (As Rajiv Chowk continues to be Connaught Place.) Despite being just another aged infrastructure utility, Minto Bridge is special. The brick masonry edifice is a symbol of the exasperation that Delhiwale feel for Dilli. Every time it rains, the underpass gets flooded, triggering handwringing, and tweets, from frustrated citizens. The bridge’s penchant
City Landmark – Banyan Tree, Kautilya Marg Landmarks Nature by The Delhi Walla - July 16, 20250 A gentle giant. [Text and photo by Mayank Austen Soofi] Consider this banyan. The tree’s massive trunk looks like as if hundreds of separate snake-shaped trunks had fused into each other. These are actually the tree’s aerial roots. Also known as prop roots, they grow out from the tree’s branches, going downwards. This particular tree has to be among the Delhi region’s most extraordinary banyans. To be sure, the megapolis is full of dense ridges and forests, not all of which are easily accessible to citizens. Those unexplored spaces might be harbouring even greater banyans. That said, this banyan is extraordinary in its scope and beauty, and reaching it is easy. The tree stands by the roadside, on Kautilya Marg, beside Jammu &
City Landmark – Bob Dylan’s Bench, Paharganj Landmarks by The Delhi Walla - July 10, 2025July 11, 20250 Dissecting a locality through a café bench. [Text and photo by Mayank Austen Soofi] This muggy afternoon, a profusely sweating man is spray painting a sequence of words on the slats of a bench’s backrest. Using large stencils, he is painting in white, ostensibly intending to give the bench a name. The first letter is B. The brown bench is plonked outside Madan Café, here in backpackers’ Paharganj. The man at work is Aditya. His father had founded the café in the 1970s, just as the Delhi locality was starting to get its first hippies. Indeed, the café used to be packed with hippies. What a thing it was, per the old timers, to be in the community of those vanished people. Their
City Landmark – Gateway Flyers, Chirag Dilli Landmarks by The Delhi Walla - July 8, 20250 Reading the walls. [Text and photo by Mayank Austen Soofi] Are you among one of those who like snooping around a neighbourhood’s intimate life? Wanting to sniff out the pursuits and concerns of the locality, its hopes and aspirations, and secrets. All you have to do is to read the neighbourhood’s walls. Particularly the flyers that lie stuck on the grimy peeling concrete of those walls. The very flyers that are replenished with fresher flyers in predictable regularity. New flyers stuck on old flyers. This strategy works well for the gateway guarding the entrance to south Delhi’s historic Chirag Dilli village. The gateway has no name. The locals refer to it as khandahar, ruin. Whatever, sample the flyers pasted on the rugged
City Landmark – Ishtiaq’s Shaving Stall, Chelmsford Road Landmarks by The Delhi Walla - June 25, 2025June 25, 20250 Ode to hajamat stall [Text and photo by Mayank Austen Soofi] Hand mirror nailed to the pavement wall. Chair turned away from the street, facing the small mirror. Such is the introverted world of a hajamat stall—the shaving establishment on the city pave. Improvised from most basic elements, the barber sets it up every morning with care and attention. He dismantles it at the day’s end, erasing the stall so completely from the face of earth, that, on gazing at the vacant space, you wouldn’t believe it existed. This institution is sighted across Delhi. Citizen Ishtiaq’s shaving establishment is standing out these days for being among the capital’s most picturesque. The stall is currently glowing in pink, having been raided by flamboyant bougainvillea bushes.
City Landmark – Absent Tree, Lodhi Garden Hangouts Landmarks by The Delhi Walla - June 24, 2025June 24, 20250 A fragile renewal [Text and photo by Mayank Austen Soofi] The skeletal tree used to stand here, in the middle of the grassy expanse, facing the centuries-old stone monument. Now the spot is a muddy brown patch. Delhi’s Lodhi Garden is full of extraordinary trees, but this dead tree was special. Though leafless for a long time, it had continued to stand, lending the park a heart-touching beauty. The tree fell on its own accord two weeks ago. A dispatch on the loss appeared on these pages a day after. This evening, we are back to the place. Not to mourn, but to investigate what happens after a much-loved city landmark vanishes. What replaces the gaping loss? How does the affected place