Green Delhi Grey Patches

Delhi Golf Course

Pic By: Gayatri Pradhan (ToI)

NOW THAT the monsoon has gone, one is reminded of a patch of green in Delhi between Subhash Nagar and Mayapuri that attracted the eye after the rains had done their bit to heighten the splendour in the grass. When the office-goers were away and the housewives were busy with their chores and the children were in school, out came the cows and buffaloes to feed on the verdure and pass the day chewing the cud. The cowherds that came with them had changed with the times, as was evident from their dress, but their occupation continued as of old -- watching the cattle the daylong.
The cows were both fat and thin and also the buffaloes. But the lean and plump grazed equally hard, unmindful of the crows and the mynas that occasionally alighted on their backs to feed on the insects worrying the poor animals. And so time drifted, like the clouds overhead and the dragon-flies buzzing around. To the few who had the time to stand and stare -- it was an idyllic setting, minus the pipes of Pan. The goat foot is said to have haunted such spots as these, with the dryads and the nymphs making merry under the trees or around fountains.
The Greeks thought he was a God but the shepherds and other village folk regarded him as a prankster who did not spare even the nymphs. Was he an invention or a reality? But his absence was made up by the Mongol boy, who came to play on this verdant patch with his bat and ball. There were times when the boy forgot to play and stared at the cattles, scared to get too close to them but looked at them with a kindly eye. He was a moody chap and when the mood seized him he could out-dance Pan, because the God did not know the steps that the centuries have invested us with. His was an all-encompassing dance, the Indian and the foreign combined, thanks to TV. And as for the pipes, his little stick acted as a flute at times and whistling made up for the melody. Surely the cows and the buffaloes did not dance at this music, nor did the trees sway, nor did the clouds bend low to watch the show. But there was an Alsatian dog that answered to the name of Tiger and followed the Mongol boy as a guard, though a woman kept watch on them both from a second floor DDA flat.
So much for the modern Peter Pan and on the verdant spot where the cattle grazed the daylong and students coming home from the school pelted stones at the Jamun tree, which was loaded not with the big but the small fruit that was not liked much but was said to be more beneficial than the delicious kind. As the stoning grew in intensity with the arrival of larger number of boys, out came an old man armed with a stick, followed by his wife. The couple used their sticks to take the cattle home and milk them for the evening. The spot lost its charm as the cows and buffaloes trooped away, followed by the boys, but when dusk descended and the fireflies got moving one was again tempted to watch the place from the terrace, for it indeed was a charmed spot even at that hour. Now there's another attraction.
Atop a DDA flat in a West Delhi colony dwells a tateeri -- lapwing. Misnamed this brain-fever bird because of its shrill, short cry has been the subject of much comment down the centuries. Why should this rainbird, which is said to have a hole in its throat, live on a terrace overgrown with weeds? People sleeping under swirling fans and sweating it out on a hot oppressive night wake up with a start on hearing its cry and murmur, "Rain, Rain''. The belief is that it can only slake its parched throat with raindrops. So whenever it needs a drink of water it calls out to the skies and the clouds oblige. Of course an ornithologist would have a different story to tell but to keep up pretences one would like to think that whatever the rainbird really has ever on its brain needs the precious drops from heaven to calm it down. Probably "summer pools can hardly cool the fever on its brow.''
There are no summer pools in the colony where this particular bird dwells. But in the park nearby there is a hydrant from which water flows to keep the grass from withering. The tateeri hovers here at odd hours, thereby giving the lie to the "hole in the throat'' theory and also to the story that it was once a princess whose neck was cut by a wicked stepmother in the distant past when witches rode on brooms and tied up the wind so that little birds might fall into their laps