HOMAGE TO OLD DELHI

How will a changing Shahjahanabad, on whose horizon lurks a revolution, change the fate of a princess?

A Firestorm in Paradise: A novel on the 1857 Uprising Author Rana Safvi unspools the aches of a young heart as she pays homage to Old Delhi―which, like a living, breathing being, has many moods and survives a lifetime in this novel. Shop Now

Today was the Jharokhon ka Zanana, a day when the ladies of the mahalsara came out of the palace to enjoy the fair that was held especially for them under the jharokha, as the balcony jutting out over the Jamuna was called, on the river’s sandy bank. It was here that crowds gathered at dawn, every morning to pay their respects to the Badshah, and Falak Ara had often studied them from her small room in one corner of the mahal, as she sketched scenes. There was a young man who came every day and stood under that balcony, resplendent in his jama, with pearls around his neck and a dagger tied in a sash on his waist. Like her, his jama was made of chintz, and it would have beautiful damask roses or designs of the opium poppy, iris and lily. Sometimes his jama would be almost plain while his silk sash was profusely decorated with floral patterns. She had seen the same motifs on the floral borders that framed the miniature paintings in the kutubkhana.