Delhi Walk Festival – Mehrauli and You

[sg_popup id=”2″ event=”onload”][/sg_popup]Delhi Walk Festival conducted a first of its kinds where streets of Delhi were covered by people trying to find streets and galiyan. Spread across a week, 21-28 February 2016, it brought around 50 walking groups to conduct 85 walks in different parts of Delhi.

Hidden-Pockets along with Reclaim the Nights, Delhi chapter conducted a Mehrauli walk, locating safety discourse within walks especially walks at nights.

We walked from Ojas Art Gallery => Bhool Bhulaiya => Jamali Kamali => Qutub Minar Metro Station.

With around 41 walk lovers it did seem like a huge task, walking through this maze of Mehrauli, talking about safety and trying to understand the hidden layers of city and night. What we encountered host of questions, host of curiosity, willingness to peer through one’s own thoughts and resistance to a certain model of development

The walk was divided into 3 neat zones. The first zone included the walk from Ojas Art Gallery to Bhool Bhulaiya, which encompassed the main road that connected the Mehrauli village to the city. Devoid of pedestrian paths, the walk was bit tedious, especially since most of the walk lovers were new to this place. At Bhool Bhulaiya, the beautiful tomb, we took a small break to read some poetry by Ravish Kumar. We were also trying to open up conversations around night, Delhi and pleasure, and how we could re-think this safety model and make it more inclusive.

From there, we headed towards Fruit market and finally took a break in front of ridge. We were about to enter Ridge post 8 pm and it was not much lit. We wanted to experience the idea of a walk at night, without street lights. We wanted to engage in conversations around safety and ask ourselves, why do we feel so safe within lights.

We did realize it was poetry and conversations that kept the walk going. It was a wonderful experience of enjoying a slow walk, along the lanes of Delhi, lanes that might not intersect your daily paths, but still one would like to experience.

Photo Courtesy: Pallavi
We are back with the walk on 29 July. Book tickets here.