After the Supreme Court restrictions on crackers, Deepavali this year may not be as noisy and polluting as earlier. In this regard old memories are an eye-opener. Radhey Mohan of the famous Chandiwalle family once recalled that from accounts he had heard from elders like Lala Ramkishan Das, Deepavali 100 years ago was a more sober and genial festival. His maternal great-great father, Lala Iswar Das, after whom a katra in Chandni Chowk is named, and his adopted son, Lala Banarsi Das, were at the helm of affairs in the Coronation Durbar year. Their shop was in the Meena Bazar of the Red Fort’s Chatta Chowk. Silver (chandi) was mostly imported in those days and made into ornaments and utensils. The shop must have done brisker business in 1911.
The family lived in Katra Kushal Rai’s Rang Mahal, opposite which was the Sheesh Mahal in which St Stephen’s College was first started, before it moved to Kashmere Gate and then to its present location. Both the mahals, named after the palaces in the Red Fort, were built on huge plots of land. They now exist in a dilapidated state with hundreds of tenants who live on a paltry rent. A hundred years ago the owners’ families were so big that they occupied the mahals by themselves, with each member having seven, eight or even nine children. The most important ritual then (as now) was Ganesh and Lakshmi Puja on Deepavali evening, which was a family occasion though some traders held the prayers at their shops, where members of their household also came for participation. Kheel batasha and toys made of khand (unrefined sugar) were sent on big silver plates (thals) by each family to their relatives and acquaintances. The thals went with the sweets, made by special halvais and were a gift along with the mithai. This was the usual practice at most havelis, including the one of Lala Chunna Mal in Katra Neel.
Personally speaking, Deepavali means a visit to the Walled City. It has been so for the past 50 years or so when as a young man I lived in hotel in the area and later carried the children in my arms, with their mother following after in the hunt for Deepavali toys sold in the temporary shops set up in Chandni Chowk and Chawri Bazar. Television had hardly made its presence felt in those days and mechanical toys were not much in fashion. Clay toys or papier-mache ones attracted children. There were the special toys for girls which brought the whole kitchen alive for them, with nearly all utensils, and even a well. For the boys there were the soldiers, especially the bugler and, of course, the animals and birds. The pride of place, however, was taken by the gujaria, with a mutka on her head, in which the kheel was placed. Toys made of sweet were also popular and eaten with great relish, starting with the elephant’s trunk and ending with the camel’s hump.
To bring the toys home without breaking the beaks of the delicate birds or the soldier’s bugle was a difficult task. And God forbid if any of these broke on the way. A howl of protest greeted one as soon as the loss came to light and only another visit to the market could satisfy the one whose lot it was to receive the broken toy.
Came the evening with its profusion of crackers and after the children were safe in bed, it was time to see Deepavali glow all over the town. For this one walked down Esplanade Road, past the temple of Rama and Dauji and into Chandni Chowk again. The scene that greeted the eye there was one of serenity. The shopkeepers sitting on their gaddies with their wives and children filling up the shops for their once-a-year special visit.
There were shops where the families were missing and only an old sethji sat with folded hands praying to Lakshmi. The diyas burning in front of him cast a magical glow over the shop and one felt that here certainly was the true spirit of Deepavali. It was just a nostalgic visit for one given to romanticising such events as it is now. It was also a time when prices were not so high, a time when old values had still not been discarded.
Now the children have grown up and toys do not interest them any more, save for the one who will remain a child all his life. Yes, for him toys are still bought and broken beaks adjusted with wet flour and then the gujaria’s mutka filled with kheel-batasaha. Deepavali crackers interest him if they are not loud and the lights of diyas hold a fascination as they shine in the DDA colony from every house that the eye can see. It’s for children like these that Deepavali still holds a natural thrill.
It is also something which one has come to relish, both for the sake of the Mongol child, who does not grow up, as for one’s own memories hidden away in the years of youthful jollity. And when the last crackers have ceased to make a din, one sees in the mind’s eye the wealthy seths of old making obeisance to the goddess with their families. It makes you too wait for Lakshmi, keeping a light near the door. But she doesn’t come this way anymore, you know! Nevertheless, this year too it will be the same anticipation that will make one hope against hope and peer at the main door through the darkness to the spot where the candle burns in anticipation of cherished desires and all the good things that one longs for on a Deepavali night.