VERVEMAGAZINE.IN 97up in an environment where things like art and culture
mattered more than just running after money.” She has
several anecdotes to share, and as we walk from one
tidy street to the next, she tells me about the time that
‘Willy’ — William Dalrymple — dropped by her house for
breakfast because he’d never tasted akuri or the time
she travelled to Israel and an airport personnel asked to
shake her hand because he’d never met a Parsi before.
She points out a house that has Masonic symbols
engraved into its design, an indication of the cult the
residents used to be a part of. She tells me about the
Panchgani Garden (there are a total of 14 gardens in
DPC, this one makes you feel like you’re in Panchgani,
apparently), a large tree-filled space taken over by
senior citizens for their walks and which holds beneath
the grass the water supply for the entire colony in an
underground tank; and about the DPYA (Dadar Parsee
Youths Assembly) school, which earlier used to be
a resting place for the deceased, allowing people to
pay their respects. The building, since it wasn’t used
too often, was converted into a school (by the trust it
is named after) — the sort of social tinkering informed
by logic and need that much of the city outside
lacks. Kayomi, who has worked on restoration projects
in Kala Ghoda, is an aficionado of buildings and design.
“Sometimes, when I meet architects or builders, I very
presumptuously say, ‘Can you please put an Islamic
panel or a kalamkari motif?’ Because that building is
going to be there for generations, for everybody to see.
So why not make it a little pretty?”
She waves at a couple riding on a scooter with their
child, a common sight in DPC, which stretches from
Matunga to Wadala and has different postal codes
from one end to the next. “I have met a couple of
octogenarians who grew up in a particular building here,
then another one came up so they lived in that one for
a bit, and then went and lived down the road in another,
by working out a lease with a landlord. What a lovely
way to grow up! Within one district, you could be your
own tourist.”
“The Hindu Colony, which was planned in parallel to
the DPC, doesn’t look the same,” says Kayomi. “Parsis
at that time were slightly more...if I may say it without
sounding impolite...well-cultured; they could hire the
better architects. The bawajis held the paisa, so they
could hire the right architects and contractors who
built these glorious buildings. Lesser architects began
replicating these in the Hindu Colony, but the Gujaratis,
with their large families, needed more apartments.
Today, when I walk to the Hindu Colony, I feel like I’m
in a war-torn country. My very sweet friend from the A
ward office says to me often, ‘Mumbaiche atirikt shilpkar
tumhich Parsi log aahat’ (‘You Parsis are the foremost
architects of Mumbai’).”
This reminds me of the famous tale, part of Parsi
folklore, which Zareen had recounted earlier. The
Zoroastrians of Persia (modern-day Iran) fled to avoid
forceful conversion by the Islamic invaders and landed
in Gujarat by sea. Because of the language barrier, King
Jadi Rana brought out a glass full to the brim with milk
to explain that there were too many people in his land
already. The Zoroastrian priests then promptly added
a spoonful of sugar into the milk to show how easily
they would blend in among them and also sweeten the
land, helping it prosper with their presence. “I think
we’ve made good on that promise,” Zareen had smiled,
looking around.
The pursuit of perfectionism becomes evident
after spending just a few hours in the colony. Typically
earnest, typically urbane, it’s a sentiment that you
perceive more powerfully than any visual, and there is a
clearly-defined community life that smacks strongly
of ‘we’, due in part to the sad reality that Zoroastrians
are fighting the extinction of their faith, a monotheistic
religion that most scholars say is at least 3,000 years
old. A 2004 survey, by the Federation of Zoroastrian
Associations of North America, estimated a maximum
of a 1,90,000 Zoroastrians in the world, of which about
70,000 resided in India — where they are called Parsis —
with Mumbai acting as the global epicentre. The number
is much smaller now — 57,000 according to a 2011 India
census. So, survival has become a community obsession
and has led to their congregating among themselves,
continuing to discourage intermarriage and withdrawing
into their adopted zones. The only area that doesn’t
seem physically and psychologically divorced from
the rest of the city at DPC is the Five Gardens, where
‘non-Parsis’ abound. How a place can open up to a
new phase of social confluence without ever changing
its beliefs over a century is the real story of the Dadar
Parsi Colony. Making and remaking itself not from the
top-down but from the ‘people up’. While many from
the community have flourished economically, this is also
a place where the less fortunate can find affordable
housing with luxurious amenities and space since it’s
owned by trusts and co-operatives — and Mumbai’s
desperate population eyes it greedily. “Mumbai is
becoming this megapolis of culture. It’s giving rise to
so many urban issues, which is why I use the Instagram
account to remind the people of DPC that you have to
learn to take care of this, because there is nothing of
the sort anywhere else.”
“I haven’t grown up here, so I view things differently,”
says Perzen Patel, known popularly in the blogosphere
as Bawi Bride, who married into DPC and often conducts
cooking classes in her home to teach Parsi staples like
kheema (minced meat) kebabs and her grandma’s Parsi
fish curry. “In a typical day, all sorts of vendors from the