Delhiwale: This way to Gali Sheesh Mahal

In Gali Sheesh Mahal, sunlight reveals a quaint lane with a historic residence, community dogs, and locals sharing stories, embodying a vibrant neighborhood life.

The afternoon sunlight is filling up a breach in the street-side wall. The breach turns out to be the opening of a side-lane full of its own turns and tributaries.

A dog in Gali Sheesh Mahal. (HT Photo)

Gali Sheesh Mahal’s name promises nothing less than a glass palace. But the lane has no sheesh mahal. Some grandness exists in a sprawling residence. It has an old-fashioned wooden balcony, and within the stately door, a darkened courtyard flanked by fluted columns. A plastic basket is hanging down the steep staircase, presumably as a shortcut to send household stuff from the courtyard to rooms upstairs.

“Our makaan must be more than a hundred years old,” says the lady standing in a corner of the courtyard, cooking chapatis over a cooking range. Suddenly, a spotty brown pug, face as wise and wrinkled as that of an old man, wobbles along, jumping up the visitor’s knees. “Coco, baitho,” the lady orders the dog to sit.

Meanwhile, a community dog outside is sitting in the middle of the lane, beside R.R.S. Trading Welding Machines Sales & Service. Passers-by are pausing to pat its head. It bears the contented face of a person who knows it is loved by many.

Now an elderly man, wearing the French-style beret cap, enters the scene, carrying a pack of green peas. He stops to greet a woman sitting at the chai stall of venerable Padam ji. Eavesdropping on their chat reveals it is their first encounter. The woman says she is a visitor from Italy. He says he was born in this very street, and that he once visited the Italian town of Verona for work. He has actually spent a part of his life in Prague, he casually remarks, where he would trade in offset printers.

“In Prague, beer would be cheaper than water.” The man gave up his life in Europe for a reason, he says. He returned to his native street, all those years ago, to take care of his elderly mother. He says he is long retired and lives alone.

As he patters on, another man is getting his bandaged foot treated at bone-setter Pappu Pehelwan’s adjacent clinic.

Further ahead, closer to the impasse where Gali Sheesh Mahal abruptly bumps into a forlorn window, a dog is blocking the way. The expressions on his face are exuding utmost nobility—see photo.