By Ekta Chauhan and Sadaf Hussain
As one of the oldest “cities” of Delhi, Mehrauli has seen dynasties fight for her, like someone fighting for their beloved. Mehrauli village has survived and thrived as a spiritual center, a trading post, a wholesale market and now among the favourite destinations for the city’s elite to buy couture wedding wear.
If you get off the Chandini Chowk and Mehrauli metro stations connected through Delh’s crowded yellow line, you’ll be struck by the beauty of the city’s architectural heritage. The roads narrate a visual story, a perfect blend of modern and ancient lifestyles. While the city of Shahjahanabad (outside the Chandini Chowk metro station) is popularly known as Purani Dilli or Old Delhi, Mehrauli can be seen as the original Old Delhi.
The area currently occupied by the metropolitan and modern city of Delhi has been a popular choice for a capital among several dynasties since at least the 11th century. As a result, historians identify seven extant cities of Delhi (some even put the number at 9 or 14); Mehrauli being the first.
For centuries, Mehrauli has witnessed construction activities. Mehrauli traces its roots to the Tomar city of Lal Kot built by Raja Anangpal Tomar in the 8th century. This is the first documented city and the remains of the city can be found around Sanjay Van and the Qutub Golf Course. The next wave came with Qutub-ud-din Aibak, founder of the slave dynasty who built the Qutub Minar or Victory Tower in 1193 AD. This was followed by a slew of building activities with other rulers of the same period, Altamash, Razia Sultan and Alauddin Khilji leaving traces of their rule in the area. Even as capitals shifted out of Mehrauli towards the north, the area continued to witness building activity till the Mughal and British period. Due to its location — it is bounded by the Aravallis hill range — the area was preferred as a summer retreat over the congested capitals of Shahjahanabad and later, New Delhi. Summer palaces of the Mughal emperors (Zafar Mahal and Jahaz Mahal) and Sir Thomas Metcalfe (Dilkhusha) are situated here.
The high concentration of archaeologically significant sites in the area led to establishment of the Mehrauli Archaeological Park, Spread over 200 acres, it consists of over 100 historically significant monuments. The park lies adjacent to the UNESCO World Heritage Site complex of Qutub Minar and Mehraauli village.
“Ghoda apna tagda hai dekho kitni charbi hai, chalta hai mehrauli mein par ghoda apna arabi hai” (The horse is strong, look how fat it is. Walks in Mehrauli but the horse is Arabian). This verse of the popular song “Lakdi ki Kathi” from the 1983 movie Masoom evokes an historical imagery; of trade and commerce on the streets of Mehrauli (of at least Arabian horses). Though it might sound apocryphal, these lines do reflect a version of historical reality; that of a thriving market in Mehrauli.
The existence of this area as an important post on the trade route between Delhi and neighboring areas is evident by the series of old pyau, kos minars and serais found here. As per Atlas of the Mughal Empire by historian Irfan Habib, the area would have been along the trading route connecting Bara Pula (a Mughal period bridge in Delhi) to Pataudi, Rewari and Narnaul (in present day Haryana). Historian Swapna Liddle adds that while we cannot ascertain the origins of the current market as the nature of settlement kept changing, we can establish that this area lay on the route between Delhi and Gurgaon by the 19th century and was also the preferred location for a second home for people living in Shahjahanabad. Both these factors naturally led to the growth of a commercial space and necessitated the realignment of the Gurgaon road to its present location.
Historian Rana Safvi in her book Where Stone Speaks talks about Sultan Jalaluddin Khilji’s (1290-1296) contribution to building the bazaar (market) in Mehrauli. He settled the merchants within the walls — A grain market/mandi by Mandavi Darwaza of Mehrauli and a cloth market known as Sara-E-Adl near Badaun Gate. Both gates do not exist any longer. In her book, she also mentions a Madhi Masjid, earlier known as Mandiwali Masjid, and suggests that perhaps there was a wholesale mandi of grains nearby which disappeared and the name Mandi became Madhi over the course of time.
Manohar Lal Anangpal, a resident, talks about his life around the bazaars of Mehrauli. His father, RN Anangpal, came to Mehrauli after the Partition in 1947 and after trying his luck with multiple business ventures, he settled down as a vegetable retailer. Initially the family found Mehrauli to be more like a “biyaban” (wilderness) than a city. Being closer to the Aravali mountain range, the area is a part of the biodiversity zone. While now, the wilderness is reduced to an urban forest (Sanjay Van), the Anangpal family would have arrived in a village surrounded by thick greens and rocky terrain. RN Anangpal started buying vegetable batches of only 2.5 kgs from other larger vendors and catered to the growing population of the village post Partition.
Manohar (61) has seen the lanes of the village change — from broad lanes where even two buses could run at the same time to a narrow street that can barely accommodate two wheelers. He recalls that there used to be a major market adjacent to a mango tree near Chattewali gali (close to Adham Khan’s tomb), but as Mehrauli opened its arms to people, residential houses replaced the bazaar.
Commenting on the recent changes in his trade, Manohar says: “The shop was quite popular earlier. Locals would say ‘Let’s buy our potatoes and onions from Pandit ji’ but now the rules of trade have changed. Personal and emotional connections are now replaced with mobileconnections. We are doing financially better but from an in-person trade we are moving towards online business.”
Bishan Das’s family too came to Mehrauli after the Partition and settled down in the same lanes selling fruits. Das, now 68, opened his store in 1979 and has seen his business evolve — from selling local fruits to the community to exotic fruits (dragon fruit, kiwis, etc) catering to the needs of the elite farmhouses between Mehrauli and Gurgaon. He says that the nature of trade has changed drastically in the post 1990 period. The bullock and horse carts that used to frequent the bazaars have disappeared and from being a wholesale “mandi” specialising in food products, Mehrauli has been reduced to a cluttered and unorganised market.
The reputation of Mehrauli as a thok mandi (wholesale market) is well established among the older residents of urban villages of the city, especially South Delhi.
Kartar Chauhan, a resident of Khirki village, says that farmers would collectively hire a bullock cart, load their produce (especially wheat and jaggery) and set off to Mehraulli after the harvest season. According to him and several other residents across urban villages of the area (such as Chattarpur, Hauz Khas, Lado Sarai, Shekh Sarai, Chirag Dilli), Meherauli was the main market for at least 56 villages. Even though farmlands were formally acquired by the government in the 1960s, agriculture in the urban villages of this area continued till the ‘70s and even ‘80s as possession was not completed. Thus, the feeder area for the mandi only dried up after the 1980s when agriculture completely stopped and villages were urbanised.
Several generations of Mohammed Jaffar’s family have lived in Mehrauli. Jaffar proudly shares memories of his ancestral house near Zafar Mahal. Recalling a story told by his grandfather, he says, “Khomche wale baitha karte the hamare ghar ke paas jinhe pata hota tha hamare ghar pe kaun si sabzi khatam ho gayi hai aur kya hamare pasand ki hai (Vegetable vendors used to sit in front of our house every day and knew what is not available in the house and what the family liked).”
His grandfather had witnessed the riots during the Partition but Jaffar recalls how the spirit of brotherhood among Hindu and Muslim neighbours helped him and others tide over the difficult times. Jaffar, however, laments the growing distance between the two communities. He says that while everyone continues to do business together, there is an increasing segregation of residential spaces and ghettoisation. At the same time, he and several others in the area continue to place faith in their community and the blessings of “Baba”.
Popularly referred to as “Baba” or “Khawja ji”, sufi saint Hazrat Qutubuddin Bakhtiar Kaki (1173 -1235 AD) is revered across religious communities well beyond Mehrauli. The 13th century saint is buried here and his dargah has been one of the reasons for the area’s popularity among medieval rulers to undertake construction here. The dargah, however, was also a site of sectarian tensions during the 1947 riots and it was only after Mahatma Gandhi’s visit just days before his assassination that peace could be established and the management of the dargah was handed over to its original cutsodians.
Another spiritual center for the community is the Yogmaya mandir, believed to be one of the oldest in the city. Yoginis (semi-divine deities) have been an integral part of Indian folklore and this temple dedicated to them is believed to have been constructed by the Pandavas.
The cosmopolitan spirit and secular heritage of Mehrauli is perhaps best expressed in the annual community celebration of ‘Phool Walon ki Sair’ or Sair-e-Gulfaroshan (walk of the flowers). This 19th century Mughal era festival was revived in 1962 by India’s first prime minister, Jawaharlal Nehru, and has become the symbol of the city’s communal harmony since then. The three-day festival includes processions and festivities led by shehnai players and dancers. An offering of pankhas (large floral fans) is made to the Yogmaya Temple and a chadar is offered at the dargah of Khwaja Bakhtiyar Kaki.
Mehrauli continues to fascinate its visitors — the young and the “hip” flock to its many clubs and boutiques, historians are often found meandering through its narrow lanes studying one of its many structures, tourists flock to Qutub Minar, and pilgrims go to its temples and dargahs to seek comfort in the divine. The Mehrauli bazaar continues to exist in the shadows. You can still find the dehati hookah (rural hookah made of wood) in the last two remaining stores, desi gur (jaggery) sourced from Meerut, freshly grounded spices, khant (traditional wooden cot) and personally engraved tin sandook (storage boxes).
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