Mega-Delhi

Essay video

Mega-Delhi is an online essay-video about the big significance of a small corner of Delhi facing imminent change. Taking inspiration from the late 18th-century style of Urdu poetic lamentation known as shahr-ashob ('city disturber') wherein the poet keenly observes a rapidly changing city in a world turning upside down, Mega-Delhi layers personal narratives with experimental research to bring a literally magical but doomed neighborhood of Delhi known as ‘the Colony of Wooden Dolls’ in and out of focus. Ultimately, this project celebrates the Delhi poets' eternal charge to create beauty in the face of grave uncertainty and radical change.

Past engagements: 

Reflections Gallery, Shahpur Jat, Delhi;

Goethe Institute, Delhi;

Lebenskunst Festival, Berlin.

This project is supported by a Creative Capital Award.

How To View

This project will only play on a desktop or laptop (phone version is very limited)

Some pages have text you can scroll while video plays automatically underneath.

Ideally, the background video will match up as you read, but it’s not necessary.

Some of these text pages have audio buttons at the top for background sounds.

Click ‘play’ and the sound will accompany your reading.

Other pages have self-contained videos that play when you click the large square button.

Self-contained videos will play in a lightbox so you can have control of the player.

When the video finishes, click the ‘x’ to exit the video lightbox.

For best audio, please use headphones !

The link below will open the project in a separate window: