The Hindu : Andhra Pradesh / Hyderabad News : Those were the days...

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Sunday, Aug 14, 2005

Andhra Pradesh

Andhra Pradesh - Hyderabad

Those were the days...

Staff Reporter

Book gives vintage Hyderabad an elaborate `Salaam'

HYDERABAD: Life then moved at a leisurely pace, yet it was never lazy. Despite the "one by two" tea shared with friends in the Irani hotels, life was full and fulfilling. It was a city more than a concrete jungle and people were human beings than mere numbers in the voter's list.

People who were born and raised in the gallis of this charming Charminar city a few decades ago, long for those good old days.

"Salaam Hyderabad" authored by Lokeshwar brings back those great memories and takes them through a trip down the nostalgia lane.

"It is a Hyderabadi's autobiography," Lokeshwar said at the release ceremony of the book held at Potti Sriramulu Telugu University on Friday.

Serious research

It's a work of five years of research that led him to various libraries to go through the collections of various writers' experiences about the city.

"I read Urdu, Kannada, Telugu and English books on Hyderabad and its people," says Lokeshwar, who is inspired by Kushwant Singh's "Dilli" and William Dalrymple's "White Mughals".

"Historic cities like Delhi, Calcutta and Lahore have books written on their people and culture," he says adding that this book is an attempt to convey the "tehzeeb" of Hyderabad.

Mr. Lokeshwar feels it assumes importance at a time when an attempt is being made to snatch Hyderabad from Hyderabadis via "an attack on its culture and roots."

The book covers not just the culture, traditions and lifestyle of Hyderabad but also the agitations launched from its land. Right from Qutubshahi's to the 1969 Telangana agitation, it covers every prominent struggle.

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