SA Site Cover: The Bhuli Bhatyari ka Mahal by Siddhartha Iyer

THE BHULI BHATYARI KA MAHAL

An oddly disproportional and red Hanuman stands sternly, ripping his chest open as Delhi wizzes by his feet. Many seem almost oblivious to this grand and grotesque gesture. There is a meeting to get to, a date, an assignment to submit a week after it was due, or in most cases just an air conditioner to find and set up base  in front of. Behind the statue, a thin, unassuming road slithers past all the chaos, ending at a place strikingly different from where it began. It ends in the 14^th century, at a now decrepit Tughlaq era hunting lodge.

The bhuli bhatyari ka mahal is conveniently tucked away behind the hanuman statue in busy Karol Bagh. It is a spot like so many others in the capital, where the ancient and the modern live cheek and jowl, and hopefully will continue to do so for a long time to come. It faces a large DMNC water tank, where on most occasions, the water turns a rancid green. Every few minutes, the silence around gets interrupted by the metro, just in case you forget that you still are in a city of over 25 million and counting. The entrance to the lodge is a large arch, with only hints of the original red sandstone peeking out from behind its newly ‘renovated’ walls. It opens up to a narrow corridor, winding to the right and leading up into a large open-air courtyard.  

                                               

Tiny rooms built into the surrounding walls were used most probably as accommodation for those that came and hunted here. Nothing inside them now suggests, that someone could have once rested comfortably in a space so tiny. But maybe that’s just my tall person privilege speaking? What would possibly have been a grand open courtyard, where members of the hunters convened, gossiped, planned and found momentary refuge from the city outside, is now barren and by most accounts even ‘haunted’.

                                                 
                         
To the north of the entrance, a flight of stairs lead up to a large open-air room where a small pool like structure takes up more than half of its space with channels running all the way down to the lower courtyard. Maybe around this shallow pool is where members of this club, debauched as they were, met, planned, fought and bonded over the sport of hunting beasts. In the unforgiving Delhi summers, this could  have served as an oasis for the elite. A 14^th century Delhi gymkhana anyone?

 

 The Bhuli Bhatyari is not  the original name given to this hunting lodge. Some suggest that the name came from a sufi saint called Bu Ali Bhaktiyari. What is clear, is that it was built under the reign of Feroz shah Tughlaq and is also quite similar to the Malcha mahal and Pir Ghaib, which popped up in the city around the same time.  Its exterior walls stand surprisingly high for a structure built for recreational purposes. Beyond them on all three sides, lies the dense undergrowth of the Central ridge reserve forest.

The first time I was here, was just before nightfall after I snuck in past a sleeping guard who had conveniently forgotten to lock the entrance. The other time, I was unlucky enough to be caught climbing a tree that had its branch drooping over one of the walls (the gate was shut this time) 

But, one part of me still doesn’t believe that it is indeed haunted, but the other part maybe understands why someone might think it is. Its quite easy to get carried away here. Even something as simple as a flight of stairs, become much more than just a seemingly innocuous set of steps. You’re knowingly walking on something that was walked on by thousands before you. In Delhi, and this ruin’s case in particular, you’re probably setting your foot down at the same place the emperor did. Or at least someone from the royal family, if you’re cynical. Did he stumble? Did he fall and hurt himself on the knee? Did he rush down in anger one day? Did he walk down them with one of his wives? Did he stop on the very step you did to think about something like you did? 

Maybe such thoughts only  belong here, within these walls and are too fragile to be taken into the notorious old city outside. Maybe that's why so many visitors feel and experience things here that can't simply be put into words and maybe, even at the risk of contradicting myself, i'm one of them.