Delhiwale: Metamorphosis of a sarai

Sarai Kale Khan, a bustling Delhi locality, is set to open the Rapid Rail Transit Station, enhancing connectivity while retaining its rural charm.

Mama ka Dhaba, Yash Guest House, Maa Sharda Tour & Travels… this land is full of eateries, lodges and travel agency kiosks. Every day, thousands of travellers pass through Sarai Kale Khan. The congested central Delhi locality has a bus terminus, a railway station, and a metro station. This week, Sarai Kale Khan will witness the inaugural of the ambitiously named Rapid Rail Transit Station (RRTS). It is expected to become the national capital’s first “multimodal interchange hub,” delivering connectivity to travellers across seven public transport modes. The huge station will have 14 lifts and 18 escalators.

While Sarai Kale Khan is at the cusp of a transformative change, the village continues to convey the rawness of a rural ambiance. (HT)

But Sarai Kale Khan is more than just a travellers’ halt. Even though its name has the word sarai, meaning inn, which implies it to be a transit stop. (To think of it, Delhi has many places with sarai in their name—Jia Sarai, Lado Sarai, Sheikh Sarai, Yusuf Sarai, Katwaria Sarai, Ber Sarai, Kalu Sarai, Jia Sarai, and Neb Sarai).

Close to the banks of Yamuna river, Sarai Kale Khan used to be a typical village, peopled with farmers, and their cows and buffaloes. The village also figures in history. In the book Besieged: Voices from Delhi 1857, some farmers of the village find a mention in a letter to the last Mughal king, written by the resident of a nearby village: “Taking advantage of the turbulence… the villagers of Sarai Kale Khan have collected their kinsmen and have been constantly attacking all the residents… destroyed our houses… the crops.”

Today, a segment of Sarai Kale Khan’s landowning gentry makes a living as landlords, by renting out their concrete warrens of one-room accommodations to the area’s contemporary dwellers. Many of these tenants happen to be labourers, plumbers, drivers, artisans, block printers, embroidery workers, tailors, street food hawkers, rickshaw pullers, auto rickshaw drivers, and battery rickshaw drivers.

One might think that Sarai Kale Khan must have started as a sarai for travellers. The assumption appears as a fact in the writings of late city chronicler R.V. Smith. The sarai, he once wrote, was built by a Mughal-era nobleman called Kale Khan. No remains of any old sarai exists today. But then Delhi is a city built, destroyed, re-built, re-destroyed many times over. Indeed, it is possible that the grand station opening this week might be standing upon the foundation of that same sarai.

While Sarai Kale Khan is at the cusp of a transformative change, the village continues to convey the rawness of a rural ambiance. One street intersection has a stall selling earthenware. See photo.