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Chasing the Easter Bunny
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There was a time when Easter bunnies could not to be found in the city’s sweet shops, says R.V. SMITH
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For many years after the advent of the British, the Easter bunny (rabbit) was not found in the sweet shops of Delhi but on the Ridge where it was shot or snared and brought home for the table. Those were the days when Skinner’s church was still
to come up. Sir David Ochterlony was the British Resident. Not being fastidious about showing himself as a sahib he preferred to wear nawabi robes at home when he entertained his friends at the nautch.
It so happened one evening that the girl whom he liked excused herself from the dance, saying she had a headache. A substitute was found and she danced the evening away with a number of other women. The wine flowed and so did lovers’ fancies but Ochterlony was not happy. Being too much of a gentleman he did not leave in the middle of the nautch.
As soon as the dance ended he hastened to the house of the absent girl. But being a careful man he did not enter her room but looked in through the window and saw the girl dancing with a junior officer of his entourage. He came back before they could see him but from that day the girl was never asked to dance at his parties.
Easter lunch
But coming back to Easter, it wasn’t much of a festival in Delhi during the earlier days. The British residing in Chandni Chowk, however, did have an Easter lunch at which mithai from Ghantewala’s sweet shop was much in demand. But things changed after 1860 when the Easter bunny finally made his presence felt in the shops, along with the Easter egg. This is something quite surprising because even as early as 1814, Christian influence was not absent in Chandni Chowk, where the Rev. John Chamberlain preached during the reign of Akbar Shah II. The youngsters who arrived in Hindustan were starved of female company, for the British girls were mainly confined to Calcutta where they bloomed and died young like the celebrated Rose Aylmer. So they found sweethearts among the nautch girls.
The wine that flowed at the nautch was the one made famous by Omar Khayyam, for though Edward Fitzgerald was still to translate the Rubayiat, the bard of Naishapur and other Iranian poets had long been household names in India.After the events of 1857 the British began to drift away from native mores and manners. Cantonments sprang up and those not in the army moved to the Civil Lines. Watertight compartments divided the rulers and the ruled, and, though the nautch continued, it attracted fewer sahibs. The effect was felt on festivals too and Easter was spent partly at church and partly in the outdoors. An Easter picnic at the Qutb or Humayun’s Tomb or on the Ridge was the usual way of passing the day, and in the evening it was the ball at the Delhi Club in Ludlow Castle.
The castle was demolished many years ago but it had long ceased to be the venue of ball dancers by then. Now you find very few bunnies on the Ridge, but more and more confectionery shops are stocking them, and Easter has become better known than ever before in the Capital. The nautch, alas, has gone completely out of fashion. But there are few who would dare to shed tears for it.
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