If you were to walk into Gurdwara Nanaksar in Shankar Road 30 years ago, you would have been reminded of the garden in Mandalay about which Daphne du Maurier dreamt in her famous novel “Rebecca”. One wonders how Lutyens missed this site when he was planning his Raisina or New Delhi. Probably the Ridge had not been cut at that time, as it has been now to provide for a road in the middle, though the rocks still jut out from both sides. It must surely have been a thicket in days past, and probably those who were fond of hunting partridge came all the way there from the Walled City to indulge in their sport.
Romantic setting
Trees, however, still lend to it a romantic setting which is not missed by even the travel-weary commuters who go packed in DTC buses past that way. But the skyline suddenly changes as one sees the domes of the gurdwara, and is reminded of the towers of King Arthur’s legendary Camelot, by stretching the comparison a bit, and making allowance for times, quite unlike those of the medieval period.
Still Gurdwara Nanaksar, which commemorates Guru Nanak, is one of the best gurdwaras in Delhi and perhaps in the country too, for it has an aura around it which makes one inquisitive enough to walk up the hill, through leafy paths, and see an abode of God as imagined by man and given concrete shape by the masons.
It was while walking near the gurdwara that one met Joseph Wilson, an Anglo-Indian who lived near the house of the Mahoneys in Daryaganj. That was in the 1960s when old man Mahoney was associated with the veterinary centre. Those were also the days of the hippie movement. Wilson had befriended a lot of hippies whom he used to take to the Jama Masjid area for cheap meals in the “dhabas” below the staircase of the mosque. The grub was good and the flower people from Europe and America enjoyed it though it was hot and too spicy for their palate. Sometimes, Wilson took them to Chandni Chowk where they liked to buy flowers sold in the verandah of Shiv Shankar Mandir. The flower sellers of Delhi exude a charm of their own. When the day is spent, they sit selling the seasonal blooms which attract the eye and give all-pervading feelings of freshness.
It was to Chandni Chowk that Moghul princesses once came to buy “gajras” for their hairdo. They came from the fort. But in those days flowers did not cost as much as they do now, even though that hardly mattered to the begums. The hippies loved to hear such stories and then strolled with Wilson to the gali of the parantha sellers, where vegetarian meals awaited them. Paranthas then cost four annas each and were made of pure ghee. Did they know that in the 19th Century quite a few English men and women stayed in Chandni Chowk. Many of them were killed in the 1857 uprising and it was only after that that the British started staying in the Civil Lines or the Cantonments. Wilson knew a bit of history and must have told them about these things, before walking with them to the Town Hall and thence to the park once known as Queen’s Gardens. It was there that he had met Helga and Davy, two hippies who had been residing in Delhi for some time because of the easy availability of drugs on which they were hooked.
Story of loss
Long after his meeting with the two, Wilson sent this story to a magazine. It was entitled “Helga & Davy: Flowers of Yesterday”. It read: “Last night the cop pinched Helga. She was sitting alone outside the Coffee House. It was a rainy night and the moon had not come up yet. ‘Damn the clouds,’ she said in a fierce whisper. It was then that the cop had noticed her. She thought he was going to molest her. But he just pinched her and walked away because of the sound of an approaching car. ‘She’s only a hippie girl,’ he thought, and must have experienced worse things. With this the cop was satisfied and walked away. She had a boyfriend David (Davy for short), an American who had come to India in search of the spiritual. Their affair lasted a brief summer and then one night he had become very ill after the free meal at the temple. But he didn’t recover, poor chap. They buried him in the strangers’ plot in the cemetery.
“Helga had not yet reconciled herself to his death. Life had ceased to have a meaning. There was no guru, no teacher and no philosophy if the mind was not at ease. It was a belated recognition and she couldn’t even go back to her native Ireland. The saints she had prayed to as a child were now her only solace. She remembered how her mother used to ask her on Sunday morning: ‘Helga my dear, would you like to pray to a gentleman saint or a lady saint today?’ She wished she could be back home. But her mother was dead and her father too. Her brother was killed in the Protestant-Catholic clashes in Belfast and the only sister had breathed her last in a psychiatric ward. Helga doubled up, caught her stomach and collapsed. It was the damn pain again. The Indian doctor had told her it was too late for the cancer had spread and become malignant. He had advised instant operation as a relief. But she had refused. The next morning she was found dead. And hardly anyone knew that her name was Helga and that she was Irish. They only knew she was a hippie and had died as most hippies do.”
One wonders where Wilson is now. Some said he had joined the Railways and become an engine driver, who was mentioned in a story about the ghostly vision of the two village lovers killed on the train tracks. But one always thinks of him and Helga and Davy, “flower people of yesterday” while passing by Gurdwara Nanaksar.