City of Djinns, but why did they chose Delhi

After coming to Delhi and after having traveled in the vicinity for close to a year, the answer (a partial one though) to a question I used to ask myself so many times about so many cities started to appear – why is that great cities got settled in at that particular geographical location, and not any other .. one answer which I used to give myself (which still holds good) is, wherever there were rivers, and wherever they had banks people could bank upon (comparatively flood-proof), cities got created, or rather, evolved. That also explains why most major cities (at least in south Asia) are generally on one bank of the river – cause the other bank perhaps was not bankable enough … That explains Delhi, Allahabad, Benaras, Patna, Kanpur, and numerous others (talking about medieval and pre-medieval cities here, cause once British were in, a sea-port, and not a river bank, started to derive growth of cities, and hence came into existence Calcutta, Bombay, and madras, and to some extent climate too, which accounts for Bangalore and Simla.)

But then, why it is Delhi, and not Allahabad or Benaras which had been (and is) considered heart of India, not Nagpur not Agra, all of which are more centrally located than Delhi. Kuchh to ho ga Delhi me, which is not there in any of the above mentioned cities.

OK, coming back to the point … Travelling around Delhi hints one towards the answer. The landscape, the scenery varies once you travel out of the city. It is true of any city, any place. But in Delhi this varies differently for different directions. I mean, you start north east from it and south west from it, the change in scenery is almost opposite. In the south west you step out of it, and you start feeling as if you are in some plateau type place, visibly lot more dry, with more dust and less greenery, you get something like a registan feeling … right once you step out … the population density pretty less, with large unpopulated tracts (which are now getting populated as industrial belts, like IMT Manesar, or as Farm Houses for the rich, ChattarPur, or as barracks for the Army (places south of MB Road, anything south west of Tughlaqabad). And you go north east, you'll find greenery everywhere, and lots n lots n lots of people, people hi people, so much so that on NH 58 or 24, even when them both are 2+2 lane roads, right up to Meerut / Hapur, you ‘d feel you still driving in city traffic. You go south east (NH2) or North west (NH1), you will get a feeling somewhere between these 2 extremes. Also, small dry registaani looking, barren hillocks start to appear in the south and south west, even before Mehrauli, and none of them on the northern side till you reach Kalka or Hardwar ...

So, it is not just people from different regions who coexist / meet in Delhi … it is the regions themselves … it is a sangam, but unlike Allahabd, not one of rivers but of geographies ... It is where the dryness effect sent by sands of Rajputana was stopped (thankfully) by the greenery of Gangatic plains descending from the Himalayas .. It is the LOC between these two great region-empires … But then, it is just a dot on the map, whereas Line of control is, well, a line :) …

Then why is Delhi at this point and not at any of the other points on this line, where (comparatively) sparsely populated dry areas in the south and great hare-bhare, alive, throbbing, brimming with population north Indian plains meet up – a line that can roughly be drawn from UP’s south eastern tip, through Delhi off course and all the way to southern border of Punjabs (both Indian and Pak).

This is because Delhi is unique in another geographical way as well … You see, when Jamuna comes out of the shadow of the Himalayas (literally and figuratively), and is old enough to make decisions on her own, it has a choice, to tributarize Satluj, or Ganga, to go drain itself in Arabian sea, or go get immersed in Bay of Bengal, to act as a drain to carry the waste material from the factories and homes of UPiets and Biharis, or that of Punjabis. Till Delhi, both sides seem to have almost equal chance, with Jamuna leaning towards one or the other at various points, just like a gal indecisive about its prospect, leaning, being kind to, giving hope to, both, but committing to neither :) *

Delhi is where it comes of age, makes up her mind, and takes a decision, preferring the human (and other) wastes of UPiets and Biharis to that of Punjus :).

Khair :) ... to pata ye chala ki Delhi is at point where the (roughly) east west line (the LOC of regions), intersects another almost equally important geographic line.

The line which starts from central Himalays and connects roughly to the Aravalis, and this line decides the flow of rivers. All the ones to its west 'd have to travel south west, towards Arabian sea. The ones to its east, would travel east of south east, to the Bay of Bengal. In fact, somewhere i had recently read, that last point of the aravalis is within what is now IIT Delhi campus ...

So, Delhi may not look in the center of the subcontinent on the map, but it is exactly where heart would have been. It is at the confluence of 4 major regions of the subcontinent, and with regions, automatically of cultures, and even (to some extent) religions.

Culture wise, in the south west, the rajputana region, ghagra choli starts from as early as Gurgaon, and in the NE (and possibly NW too, though i haven't got a chance to travel on NH1), it is salwar kameez ... colors are bright if u travel south (the movie Paheli, was right at least in this aspect), and subdued / normal in the north.

Ruskin's prose starts in the hills of Dehra and ends in Delhi, so does almost entire hindi sahitya, which starts in the hinterland of UP and Bihar in the east and Delhi forms its western border. The rasos and other veer-ras related stuff kept happening in the south west, and to a lesser extent, south east (bundelkhand) too.

Immediate north east is one of the most densely populated areas in india, and as one goes south (particularly south west), one of the most sparsely populated one (ignoring hills / jungles).

In terms of religion, immediate north west has highest percentage of Sikh population in india, immediate north east has the same for Muslims, So regions differ demographically too.

Also, in demography, in those 20 kms that takes for one to travel from Kalindi Kunj to beyond Airport, average height goes up by 3, 4 inches, and weight by 33% :)

The type of old houses one encounters also differ, with Havelies dominating the south and normal jhopris in the north.

No other city, except Istanbul, can perhaps boast to be a bigger confluence of differing regions than Delhi … and this was that answer :)

* aajkal ruskin bond parh raha hoon, thanks to Moajiz bhai and this sentence is ruskin's effect