Delhiwale: Lost beauty regained

The red sandstone walls are sculpted with calligraphy

The red sandstone walls are sculpted with calligraphy. Marble and black stone form flowers and stars. Every surface is as detailed as an illustrated page in an art book. Yet Delhi’s most ornate monument is little known. Maybe because it stands in cramped and super-crowded Hazrat Nizamuddin Basti, ringed by private residences.

Delhiwale: Lost beauty regained

The tomb was built 460 years ago by Mughal noble Mirza Aziz Koka for his father Atgah Khan. Like many Delhi monuments, it had fallen into neglect. The interiors were originally covered with designs painted in red, blue and green. Much of that disappeared over time. Later repairs covered parts of what survived in… cement!

The Aga Khan Trust for Culture has completed a decade-long conservation of the tomb, except for the crypt. Stone carvers repaired the red sandstone. Marble and tile inlay required other craftspeople, and the painted portions fell to another set of trained hands. The scandalous cement was removed layer by layer without damaging the old decoration beneath. The recovery of surviving fragments helped recreate the missing patterns and colours. Consequently, samples of the old pigments were lab-tested. Colours for the restored portions were made from palak ke patte (green), neel ka paudha (blue) and gudhal ke phool (red).

But the stuff above the arches is now the most stunning thing here. It is the restored pattern on the domed ceiling, see photo. A reproduction is displayed nearby at the Humayun museum, where it tends to hijack the attention away from swords and pottery in glass cases—the reproduction has become a popular selfie background for museum visitors. The real ceiling, though, is here. These patterns were not carved in the usual fashion. Instead of adding material to the plaster, rather like icing a cake, craftsmen had made the patterns by removing the plaster.

This afternoon, sunlight is entering the darkened chamber through stone jaalis, but it is no competition to these restored colours. Eventually, the eyes drop to the three white marble graves. Inscribed with flowers and calligraphy, they are among Delhi’s most decorative graves, and belong to Atgah Khan, his wife and their son.

Delhiwale: Lost beauty regained

Back on the walls, patches of black exist among the restored colours. These are the surviving remnants of the original frescoes, and were wisely left untouched. An overwhelmed visitor now walks in silence to a panel covered with blue and red flowers, slowly running the fingertips over the bouquet, see other photo. The flowers continue above his hand, until they meet a black patch, the original fresco.