(photos by Chhavi Sharma, team member, Delhi Heritage Walks & Vinay Kumar, a regular at our walks)

The ‘walk of the month’ for August was Kotla Firuz Shah: a 14^th century citadel built by the Tughluq king, Firuz Shah. A group of about 20 heritage enthusiasts braved Delhi’s summer to be part of this walk. For some of us it was a trip down the memory lane…those who had lived in the neighbourhood of Kotla and spent their childhood frequenting the ruins here, bunking classes and hiding away from home. Kotla is relatively lesser known among the historic cities of Delhi for most Delhiites. But for the locals it is actually a shrine of great significance. The locals believe that the ruins are inhabited by jinns. Continue Reading This Post

It was a lovely morning when the students and teachers of Delhi Public School, Gurgaon joined us at the Qutb complex for a heritage walk. They were students of humanities from class 11 and 12 accompanied by their Principal, Ms Aditi Misra and two senior teachers, Ms Lisa and Ms Sapna Dhawan. There was slight drizzle and breeze which made it fun to walk around the monuments. There were 4 of us from Delhi Heritage Walks: Chhavi, Divya, Kanika and Vijaya to interact with the students.

The Qutb Minar needs little introduction, so we tried to discuss the lesser known details about the complex. What is today the entrance to the site is actually part of a serai dating to the late-Mughal time. Our first stop was the Quwwat ul Islam mosque, built from material taken from temples. Some of the students had visited an active mosque earlier, so they were familiar with Islamic religious practices; others were quick to note how the sculptures were disfigured. Continue Reading This Post

It was a cloudy Sunday morning when I woke up just in time for my heritage walk. I had been very excited for a couple of days now, as this was going to be my 1^st walk as a leader. Confidence remained intact, partly being a Historian n partly because I BELONGED TO Place we were going to visit or say Chandni Chock resides in ME…

More or else everybody reached on time and met on the very first stop-Digambar Jain Lal temple. We have 8-9 stops in the Chandni Chowk heritage walk n I had to be thorough with each; its history and much more as one always expects intellectuals, educators, foreign delegates, inquisitive students ranging from class 5^th to university level to join us .Being a leader it becomes my utmost duty to be prompt to every question coming my way. Continue Reading This Post

Hauz Khas is one of the historic villages in Delhi region. And it has one of the most interesting monument complexes existing in India: the madrasa built by Firuz Shah Tughluq. ‘Hauz’ is a tank & ‘Khas’ is special or important. The name ‘Hauz Khas’ comes from the fact there existed a tank built by a king called Alauddin Khalji. The tank was originally named ‘Hauz i Alai’ after Alauddin Khalji, but later began to be called Hauz Khas. The tank still exists but in a much altered form. It now has a popular district park around it.

We started the heritage walk from the Kunzum travel café in Hauz Khas village. The monuments are located a few meters away. The madrasa is a large L-shaped building built along the tank. Once the water from the tank would have lapped at its walls; now the tank is much smaller. In fact, the Persian invader Timur, when he camped here before fighting the Delhi sultan, describes each side of the tank being more than a bow-shot long! The double storeyed madrasa is mostly in ruins now but one can imagine that it must have been a grand place. Contemporary accounts are full of praise for this complex. Continue Reading This Post