Once upon a time this was a citadel of power – of a man called the mad genius, emperor Thuglaq. Visionary, eccentric, whimsical, tyrannical – he built one of the greatest empires in Indian history and ruled it from the bastions of Jahapanah.
Little remains of this kingdom today. Standing across the campus of IIT, alongside the Sarvapriya club near the Hauz Khas metro station, a stone epitaph put up by the ASI, announces the presence of the Bijai Mandal. Overgrown bramble bush and elephant grass run amuck over what must have been large, stately palace grounds. Unadorned and bereft of any decorative grandeur that mark the citadels of contemporary Mughals, tall, majestic walls and imposing arches of stark simplicity mark the last standing structure, the BijaiMandal of the kingdom of Jahapanah. Clamber up through narrow stone staircases to the roof of the structure, and one can only imagine what this must have all looked like then, when the ramparts stretched all the way across the kutub, lal kot, siri and tuqlaqabad.
The Begumpur mosque nearby is a study in reverence and mystery. The antecedence of this place is little known. An enormous courtyard dominates, almost as large as the Jama masjid. And 5 large prayer halls dedicated for women is intriguingly unusual. The mosque complex has numerous incredibly narrow stone staircases leading both unto the roofs and down to basements and eerie passages so narrow and dark between thick stone walls that one needs to walk sideways to traverse through. Why were these built at all, and that too inside a mosque! One can only wonder.
Delhi is so full of such historical mysteries, it’s a delight to travel through them, through time.
