Chiragh-e-Dilli, or the Lamp of Delhi, was a title given to the fourteenth-century Sufi poet Nasiruddin Dehlavi, from which a neighbourhood in Delhi derives its name, as does this blog. The blog explores, discovers and suggests ways of seeing and writing the city.

Delhi for us is not just a field, a backdrop, a grid or a context. We are located and invested in its ‘being and becoming’—it tells us how and what to see, feel and imagine. We can sometimes be found sitting across Bashiruddin Ahmad, drinking endless cups of chai with him, as he draws out meticulous observations on the city. Other times, we are walking through weekly bazaars and haggling for earrings, or catching a battery rickshaw, the metro or a mudrika across the endlessly circular city for a jalebi. We are forever looking for those tiny corners of comfort and conversations, through congested alleyways of life and living, which make the city possible.