Despite urbanisation Delhi and its neighbourhood still have places where time seems to have stopped. It’s like Rip Van Winkle stepping into “Sleepy Hollow” into which Washington Irwing also managed to get a peep. Nearer home are the ruins of Mehrauli where too myth and legend mingle with reality like the Makan-e-Khirzr where the Jinns are said to congregate when not busy at Feroz Shah Kotla. That’s how William Dalrymple got to write his book City of Djinns and earlier Sir Sayyid Ahmad Khan his magnum opus Athar-us-Sanadid . Researching like them Ruskin Bond discovered the grave of the Rani of Jhansi’s vakil, John Lang in Mussoorie and a Capuchin friar the tomb of the Italian Veroneo, controversial designer of the Taj (sic) some 3 km from the monument. Similarly father found the grave of the Armenian poetess Janet (Jamiat Jan), Major Armston’s heart-throb, who died in 1885, in Shah Jahan Gardens and that of another Armenian beauty, Sitara Jan (dating to 1804), the “belle amie” of Lt. Shairph, below the walls of the Agra Fort. They were the predecessors of their latter-day compatriots Malika Jan and her daughter Gohar Jan, both established practitioners of the art of mosique (music).
As one dodges the chaotic traffic past the Sanyasi’s hut on Panchkuian Road and climbs a mound behind the cremation ground in Jhandewalan Extension, a sadhu points to a spot where was believed to be the samadhi of Bela Sidhi. Bela was the daughter of Prithviraj Chauhan who committed sati after her husband was killed in a battle that was fought in the area of what is now Pusa Institute. The place was then cut off by a rocky terrain and the battle raged nearly the whole day. Late in the evening word was brought to the Rajput ladies waiting under a clump of trees that the chieftain was dead and the battle lost. What his name was is not known nor that of his adversary.
To enter a realm of controversy, it was for Bela that Prithviraj Chauhan is supposed by some to have built the Qutab Minar, so that she could view the Jamuna every day as she dried her long hair in the morning sunshine. Conceding this claim with apologies to Qutubuddin Aibak and his successor Altamash, one can picture the young Bela busy with her coiffure amidst her maids of honour. It must have been an elaborate process for the Rajput princesses had their hair combed tight and then made into a pigtail with a ‘tika’ or ‘jhoomer’, perhaps encrusted with a diamond in this case.
Loving wife
Bela is a beautiful flower according to an old lullaby, greatly loved by God (and men of course) which had to sacrifice its life because the Maker wanted it for His celestial garden. Princess Bela named after the flower must have been beautiful too. And she also sacrificed her life for her lord and master. That act of hers was not forgotten for a mela used to be held at the samadhi of the princess where women came from far and near to pay homage to a chaste and loving wife.
Climbing up the mound and talking to the old sadhu standing under the shade of two trees, one is transported back to medieval times, even though it is hard to swallow the claim that the trees (one of which was uprooted recently) date back to that period. But then the sadhu has his own brand of history. Be that as it may, the legend of Bela Sidhi is strengthened by the belief that a mandir, commemorating her still stands not far from the cremation ground in old Jhandewalan.
A view of the ridge
It is strange that hardly any building of note was erected in the Karol Bagh area during the heyday of the Moghuls. Construction was confined to the northern and southern parts of the capital. In those days the Ridge cut off most of this area and for a long time it remained isolated. The name Jhandewalan was given during Shah Jahan’s reign, though prayer flags, Jhandas, had been offered at the Devi temple prior to that too. It has perhaps been renovated on the pattern of the Vaishno Devi shrine and is today the object of much devotion.
Far away, near the Northern Ridge, beyond the Punjabian graveyard in the Civil lines, a shepherd grazes his flock, stick on shoulder he is in a world of his own amid the lungs of a Capital plagued by agitations. The sheep nibble the grass and follow their leader. The Ridge is Delhi’s most famous landmark. In the last century the British soldiers could see the Himalayan snows from it on a clear day. At least this is what the old gazetteer says. May be because of lack of pollution the skyline was clearer then, and at night one could see the stars in all their brilliance.
The flock will browse till the shepherd has had his nap and thinks it’s time to go. Back home they don’t dream of graves and ghosts, not these sheep. Perhaps of better pastures as the shepherd is there to lead them to the Ridge, though he has never seen the snows.
