Forgotten and Forlorn. The Heart of British India's Capital.

A few steps down the narrow strip of road with just enough room for a tram track running down the middle, and several thoughts and questions crossed my mind. There was an instant reaction in some corner of my brain to everything the eye saw. To borrow the old cliche, time had stopped still in the neighborhood that lay before me. Early 19th century homes of concrete and brick, with gigantic archways, Greco-Roman colonnades, decorative balconies overlooking the street below, lined the narrow strip of road. The homes were once residences of the landholding, cultural elite of the city. Yet the archways, the pillars, the balconies all reeked of decay, degeneration and loss.

On approaching one such building, now converted in to a charitable hospital for old women, an eerie silence hung heavy over the vast property. The freshly painted yellow majestic pillars, storey-high, tightly shut windows seemed to hold in them stories of a vibrant past and a history of its passing away. Attempting to go closer to them felt like a violation of a long, preserved status quo. I stepped back and moved on, down the street.

Once called the heart of my city, these lanes seemed lost in time. Was this really the same city I called my home? The difference between where I had lived and grown up and this locality I had stepped in to on that day, seemed too much to reconcile. What did the residents of these parts make of the areas I lived in? Did they ever visit them? How had I not been here before? How did I never visit these parts? If this was once the heart of my city, why had I never seen it? To not discover the roots of a place one likes to call home seemed like a gross injustice and a loss of all sense of semblance.

A few steps further down the by-lanes led to the discovery of more hidden architectural marvels. 'Marvels', as I had not imagined I would encounter such structures here. 'Marvels' since I could not help but think what kind of manpower, planning and resources it must have taken in the 19th century for locals to build them. 'Marvels' that now lie uncared for, unkempt and bleeding. There were so many ways of restoring these places, opening them up to the public, allowing people like me who had grown up on the other side of the city to come and have a look at their heritage. And no one was saying it had to be done for free. It annoys me sometimes when I think how we let go of preserving our heritage and feeling proud of it so easily. How can we be so flippant about it? And then everyone complains how the city has nothing to offer anymore… The vitality that once characterized the 'heart' of my city is lost. I hope we do not lose the symbols that make up our memory of ourselves as a metropolis completely.