New Delhi, August 15: Mother of seven Rasheeda Malik’s door opens into the drainage of Sarai Kale Khan the part slum, part working class colony on the eastern stretch of the Nizamuddin railway station in New Delhi.
One end of Sarai Kale Khan touches the neighbourhood of the Nagli slums, which border the brand new, 1100 crore residential complex for 8,000-plus athletes participating in the Commonwealth Games in October.
Another end of Rasheeda’s colony kisses the plot on which the Jawaharlal Nehru stadium, being renovated at a cost of 961 crore as the main venue of the corruption-ridden Commonwealth Games, stands grandly like the new India arms akimbo.
The Sarai Kale Khan area’s original name was Kale Khan Ki Sarai. Kale Khan was a medieval Sufi saint who built the rest house (sarai) here for caravans going from Chandni Chowk to Mehrauli, now a New Delhi suburb — to rest.
To transport the athletes from the Games village to the stadium faster, and to protect them from the Indian capital’s nerve-wracking traffic jams, Delhi Chief Minister Sheila Dixit’s government has built an overpass.
The structure from one end of Rasheeda’s colony to another cost Rs.800 crore in total, but is only partially successful.
When India’s VIP guests traverse the overpass, they will not be shielded from the ugly sights of Nagli and Sarai Kale Khan — the public toilets without water, the innumerable illegal electric connections dangling dangerously and the muddy by-lanes constantly stinking of a concoction of fermented food.
The awe-inspiringly cash-rich Delhi government is on a spending spree to host the Games successfully, to showcase a resurgent India to the world. Blissfully ignorant, Rasheeda argues almost daily with her neighbourhood shopkeeper to sell her mustard oil in small quantities worth Rs.10.
“Our colony,” declares Rasheeda, “has people like us. The shopkeepers know who is poor and what it means to be poor. The small traders are just marginally richer than us.”
Every week, her children gleefully buy Samosa for 1 from an old woman in her insect-infested lane.
Unable to educate her elder daughter Shahzadi — or even feed her properly — Rasheeda married her off at age 16. Rasheeda’s eldest son is mentally handicapped. Her third child, Shamsher, is a bully who mostly plays with a pet parrot. He used to work with a caterer to serve food at weddings and parties.
“If you become a waiter you get free food,” Rasheeda beams. “He would bring home leftover Chicken Biryani. My other children loved it.”
Shamsher lost his job — and the family the leftover Biryani — when the catering owner realised Shamsher was a minor. Now he drives an auto rickshaw without a driving license earning about 150 every day — till the police catch him.
Rasheeda shares her story with heart-wrenching simplicity. She was born in New Delhi, the daughter of a labourer earning Rs 15. She insists they were never sad. In those days, she continues, food was cheap; the joy of family bonding was priceless.
“Bas pyar se rahte the, aur kya? (We were just happy, what else?)”
Courtesy: rediffmail