Delhiwale: Not just another footpath sight

A beautiful column embedded into a city lane in south Delhi’s Chirag Delhi village

The pillar is slender, and swells up towards the top like a sonata soaring to a crescendo. It appears to be of red sandstone but the red has faded.

The scene vividly evokes Delhi’s multilayered past.

You may spot this kind of fluted column inside the old houses in the Walled City, and also within temples and mosques.

But it will be rare to find it by a footpath so matter-of-factly. Here, snuggled deep within south Delhi’s Chirag Delhi village, the column is half-embedded into the adjacent concrete, the other half exposed to the street like a dead body washed ashore. The column lies under a weather-beaten cement platform, which has four benches facing each other. It is a popular meeting point for the villagers. This afternoon, a bunch of men are playing a card game. One of them turns around and bends down his head to examine the column. “It is called column in angrezi,” he explains (in Hindi).

A black dog jumps down from the platform, his tail fleetingly brushing the column. The scene vividly evokes Delhi’s multilayered past. Much like in Rome, Cairo and Istanbul, the previous lives of our ancient city exist in its ruins, many of which continue to survive, while many others have disappeared, or lie concealed from plain sight. Indeed, there is no knowing how often we Delhiites unsuspectingly step upon our city’s underground relics as we walk along the streets and parks. But this column doesn’t belong to any buried site. One of the card players identifies it as a discard from a nearby haveli—the area has a handful of period houses with intricately built doorways and windows. “The khamba collapsed some years ago, and was thrown out by the house owners… it was (eventually) used to lay the foundation of this platform 6-7 years ago.”

Meanwhile, in a leaf-strewn yard some steps away, a similar column is lying unclaimed under a neem tree.