On a typical Sunday evening, with the weather having turned, Mohamed Khan* and his friends Raza Ahmed and Hamid Ansani* are perched on a single motorbike seat parked outside their apartment building. They are engrossed in an intense onscreen gunfight on Khan바카라s prized possession바카라an Android phone. Their game is interrupted by a group of well-dressed visitors, led by a guide, walking in a single line.
The group is on the way to see the Hamdard factory, and passing through the narrow lane, they admire the naag (snake) motif covering the porch. 바카라This is like the gargoyles in Europe,바카라 says one man. He바카라s not wrong: snakes are used as motifs in India the same way gargoyles are in Europe: as a symbol of protection over their homes.
Khan does not know what a gargoyle is, and Europe is a distant dream for him.
바카라Yeh aapka ghar hai? (Is this your house?),바카라 asks one of the well-dressed visitors when he notices Khan and his friends checking them out curiously. Khan nods, gesturing towards a two-storey building of which the paint and the panelling on the wooden front door had long peeled off.
His family has lived in their one-bedroom apartment since the 1970s; three generations crammed within 100 square feet. The boys are sitting outside because Khan바카라s grandmother is cooking inside and the chulha (earthen stove) has made the space smoky. The smell of his grandmother바카라s korma permeates the narrow lane.
바카라Yeh aapka hi ghar hai? Yeh toh khaali lag raha (Is this actually your house? It looks empty),바카라 the visitor muses out loud. Khan doesn바카라t miss a beat: 바카라Hum reh rahain hain, is liye toh khaali hai (We are living here, that바카라s why it is empty),바카라 he shoots back. The visitors chuckle at his quick wit, but Khan knows it바카라s true.
Living on the by-lanes surrounding Chandni Chowk Road means a steady stream of visitors바카라tourists and Delhi바카라s well-off alike바카라always walking around looking for the best nahari or Ghalib바카라s haveli, says Khan. All he knows of the 17th-century Sufi poet, Mirza Ghalib, is that he once lived nearby. The visitors, he recognises on sight. 바카라Woh aatein rehtein hain puraani dilli dekhne. Aankhein gharo par hoti hain but bhool jaatein ki abhi bhi yahan log rahte hain,바카라 he says. (People keep coming to Old Delhi. Their eyes are always on the buildings, but they forget that people still live here.)
Once the centre of Sufi poetry, Mughal culture and historic architecture, Chandni Chowk has been given a 바카라facelift바카라 through redevelopment projects, initiated under the 2021 Delhi Redevelopment Plan. Experts say these ongoing modernisation efforts have overemphasised the area바카라s commercial aspects, while ignoring its residents.
바카라If you look at the government바카라s redevelopment plan, you can see they have only planned to preserve the area of the Red Fort and the rest is zoned for redevelopment, even though there are no details on what that might be,바카라 notes Pilar Maria Guerrieri, a professor of history of architecture and urban planning at the Politecnico di Milano, Italy, and author of Maps of Delhi.
Chandni Chowk, one of India바카라s largest wholesale markets and commercial districts, has always been a hive of activity. A 2014 Walmart report estimated its commercial income at approximately Rs 50 lakh crore. The 2021 Delhi Redevelopment Model, with its focus on commerce, is now reshaping this space. But as we witness these changes, we must ask ourselves: what is the true cost of this transformation?
Always conceptualised as a commercial district바카라during the time of the Mughals, Chandni Chowk operated as a bustling market around which estates or havelis were built. Before Delhi was a concept바카라merchants, Mughal royalty and poets lived and worked around the Red Fort. The British demolished large parts of the fort and surrounding canals and havelis to create a railway line and a cantonment area for the Empire바카라s soldiers. Upon Independence, the area once again saw a change with its affluent residents바카라mostly Muslims바카라migrating to Pakistan. This left behind a diverse, but economically challenged population comprising Muslims, Jains and Hindus.
The Chandni Chowk I remember was alive with activity. Street vendors offered a plethora of wares, working alongside brightly lit shops that sold handicrafts, commercial-level cookware and textiles. The main road was always bustling with visitors and residents doing errands; loading and unloading of goods was common. The Sis Ganj Sahib Gurdwara would distribute langar (free community kitchen) meals to the Chowk바카라s less fortunate residents and eager visitors. The Town Hall served as a gathering spot for labourers, and at night, one could see people sleeping on the pavements or in makeshift sleeping spaces. The Chowk, before 2021, was a blend of commerce and community.
As I walked down the one-mile road towards Chunnamal Haveli, Chandni Chowk looked different from the one I바카라d visited just five years ago. The once vibrant and bustling commercial hub now seemed to be losing its local population due to an overemphasis on commercialisation, as urban planning experts contend.
Led by the Shahjahanabad Redevelopment Corporation (SRDC), the Chandni Chowk redevelopment initiative has three main objectives: pedestrianisation of the one-mile stretch of Chandni Chowk Road, including reducing vehicular traffic; restoring the façade of heritage buildings; and, integrating modern amenities such as ATMs, public toilets, better wiring and water systems.
The notion of redeveloping Chandni Chowk came up in 2004, and the SRDC was set up in 2008. It took a decade for the redevelopment plan to be implemented in 2018. Urban planners, historians and conservation experts opposed the plan, stating an overemphasis on commercialisation and pointing out that many havelis had been torn down to make room for new development. 바카라Instead of preserving, the redevelopment plan breaks up the whole vista with bollards, shifting public utility services to the central verge of Chandni Chowk,바카라 write Arushi Raj and Aayush Ranjan for the Social Policy Research Foundation.
The focus on pedestrianisation and the construction of Omaxe Mall has also made life difficult for the local people, says Abu Sufiyaan, who grew up in the area and has spent the last decade organising historical guided tours of Chandni Chowk and other heritage areas in Delhi, including Nizamuddin.
바카라While the developers have constructed a huge parking enclosure where the Begum Ka Bagh used to be located, most of that space has now been taken over by visitors who want to come to Chandni Chowk but want to go to the AC-ed mall, not the main market or the by-lanes,바카라 observes Sufiyaan.
However, the street vendors and informal workers of Chandni Chowk have been the worst affected by the redevelopment plan. Even though the Chowk바카라s street vendors were once considered legendary for their food and intricately handcrafted wares, the beautification has forced them into other parts of the city. 바카라Many of them went to Noida or the Ghazipur Phool Mandi,바카라 says 50-year-old Nawaz Khan who teaches namaz in the local mosque.
In 2021, the redevelopment agency banned vendor carts in the area, which led to cart pullers demanding a repeal of the ban. Over 10,000 cart pullers바카라 livelihoods have been effectively erased by the ban.
The SRDC has countered these claims, saying that the stakeholders were consulted for the redevelopment plan. However, it is inside Ghalib바카라s historical haveli that it becomes most evident where the agency바카라s priorities lie. The haveli has been sized down to two rooms바카라one where a stone bust of the Sufi poet made by Bhagwan Rampure (the artist behind the iconic bronze bull sculpture at Dalal Street in Mumbai) sits between two pedestals holding what appears to the untrained eye to be the Sufi poet바카라s manuscripts. Even though encased in glass, the manuscripts are 바카라not real바카라, says Chandra Kumar, a heritage walk guide. They are a façade, much like what remains of the historical neighbourhood.
In the second room, which is filled with writing on the walls (lines from Ghalib바카라s poems and letters) and where the Sufi poet spent the last years of his life, the roof has caved in and been replaced by a tarp held up by lead pipes that are part of the unfinished construction of the roof. A similar fate is shared by many of the historical havelis in the neighbourhood, which are on the verge of falling down.
바카라It바카라s almost like they don바카라t want to keep anything Mughal,바카라 says Nawaz Khan.
