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That old lady and the Paniwalli of Meena Bazaar...

R.V. SMITH undertakes a nostalgic trip to Old Delhi's Meena Bazaar

Nostalgia doesn't differentiate between buildings and people. One can as much become fond of a structure as of a person living in it. This is about two women who disappeared without a trace from the Red Fort. But they left their mark on some hearts, like this one, all right even though one hadn't really fallen in love with them.

In the 1960s, a retired Armyman took the contract of a refreshment centre in an open space behind the Meena Bazaar. He looked the typical major with a tough bearing and a hearty laugh. His wife used to peep from the balcony of an apartment overlooking the lawn that leads to the Deewan-e-am. She looked pale and sickly but still kept an eye on happenings in the refreshment centre. One sometimes felt like stealing up the staircase and talking to her. As an Armyman's wife she must have been nearly all over the country and now in the sunset years she was cooped up in a historical building, quite different from the cantonments where officers are posted with their families when not on active duty.

The ex-major probably had his last operational posting in 1965 during the Indo-Pak conflict. Those were the days of the first blackouts in Delhi after World War II. Then, it was the fear of Jerry (the Nazi bomber pilot) that made people cover up the lanterns and lamps after the streetlights had been put off following the wail of a siren. There were no roads lit by tube lights and neon lights. It was just 100-watt and 60-watt bulbs that were fitted in exquisitely made shades suspended from solid poles of Martin Burn and Company. The lanes had lamps, which were lit by a man at twilight armed with a ladder and a kerosene can. He was a municipal employee and took care to wipe the lamp chimneys too. The lamplighter used to be followed by a group of children, who saw him as another Wee Willie Winkie.

I would, if I could, have spent half a day to know what that lady kept thinking about. Surely it was the past, which is always with us, and not the uncomfortable present or the dim future. And talking of things bygone, who could not be thinking of the Meena Bazar while sitting atop it! Shah Jahan, the magnificent, had it built for his daughters, the elder of whom filled the void created by the death of his beloved Mumtaz. Every Thursday they closed the gates of the fort and the zenana ruled the roost. They were cloth sellers who bargained for the best malmal from Dhaka, and yards of which could pass through a finger-ring; there were bangle-sellers who swore by the delicate wrists of the Moghul princesses and there were trinket-sellers who proclaimed their wares as coming from distant Samarkand and Bokhara, and there were also dealers in perfumes that smelt of Arabia, and spices from South India, which attracted the "birds of paradise" in the fields and intoxicated them with their fragrance. There were more mundane things too, such as a young woman would need for her daily use.

But that was hundreds of years ago. The latter-day Moghuls carried on the tradition as best they could until the British captured the Fort and discontinued the bazaar. It was revived after Independence. The old lady of Meena Bazaar is not seen now. After all, things have changed in the Red Fort area. Nobody calls that street Meena Bazaar any more, though the name has stuck to its twin near the Jama Masjid. It is always referred to as Chatta Chowk. Shopkeepers no longer lord it over the place after The Supreme Court crackdown on encroachments. Many of the Army barracks behind it have been vacated by Servicemen and their families. The plan to demolish all these structures, which came up post-Mutiny, is in abeyance because of second thoughts as they are nearly 150 years old, which in itself qualifies them for the tag of a heritage building.

The Paniwalli

One misses the old lady just as much as the Paniwalli who sat outside the Naubat Khana. Once Moghul nobles alighted there from their elephants before making their way to the Dewan-e-Am. Hence, its other name - Hathipol. The woman who sold water to thirsty tourists in the mid-1960s was a young widow. May be one of her admirers took her away.

The old lady was different. She was the one who cast admiring glances at visitors to the fort. Probably, after many summer, The Grim Reaper decided to strike and she too passed into oblivion.

Erratum: In last week's article in Metro Plus, The Literary Bond, Jehanara Wasi has clarified that though she works in the India International Centre library in New Delhi she is not in charge of it.

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