Jamali Kamali Mosque and Tomb - New Delhi // Mehrauli Archaeological Park  

Jamali Kamali Mosque and Tomb - New Delhi // Mehrauli Archaeological Park ‎@tripinspot
Jamali Kamali History
This story about how history and imagination infect one another unwittingly began a week after I arrived in Delhi for a month-long writing residency. The Sanskriti residents were told that we would have a chance to visit the newly restored Jamali Kamali Mosque and Tomb. It was about to open to the public. O.P. Jain, the founder of Sanskriti, was a major supporter of the restoration, thus this outing.
Our bus arrived at an overgrown park entrance where we traipsed alongside a river full of plastic garbage, climbed through hills of brush, stumbled over unrestored ruins, and finally arrived on top of a hill, a plateau, where the Jamali Kamali Mosque and Tomb stood. At its entrance, a brand-new sign informed visitors that the tomb held the remains of Jamali, a sixteenth-century Sufi court poet and saint, and a person named Kamali whose identity was unknown. The conservator of the restoration would guide us at the site.
When we entered the small space of the tomb, I was stunned by its beauty. Two white marble graves sat side by side on the floor. The red and blue circular ceiling was decorated with sunbursts and floral forms carved in plaster. A band of Jamali’s verses encircled the ceiling. The conservator spoke, “Some have thought Kamali was Jamali’s wife or perhaps his brother. Others have thought that Kamali was a disciple of Jamali, the saint. The undisputable fact is that both were men. A symbolic pen box, traditionally a sign of a male, is carved on each of their tombs. It is believed, through our oral tradition in Delhi, that Kamali was Jamali’s homosexual lover.”
“But,” I said, “the new sign out there that you just put up says his identity was unknown.”
The conservator explained that in India a public sign would never mention homosexuality.
scholar from York, England, who answered question after question as the poem unfolded.
A few facts are known about Jamali-where he traveled, the Mughal emperors he befriended, and that he was killed in battle in Gujarat-and are included in the poem. For the next year and a half, I kept writing.
I wrote one section during a month in Nova Scotia on Cape Sable Island, living in a trailer overlooking the ocean as the fog came and went. Mostly, I wrote at home. It didn’t matter where I was. Whatever was in front of me, leaves blowing or a bird hopping, appeared in the poem. I was comfortably living in the world of the characters. A year and a half passed and finally, Jamali and Kamali had had their say. The book was done.
Jarred and inspired by that fractured moment as well as the intimate beauty of the tomb, I returned to my Delhi desk, and, to my surprise, I began to write as if I were Jamali speaking to Kamali. The imaginary sound of their voices propelled me forward. I had neither plan nor goal. Seeing the beauty of their graves, hearing the tale that had been passed down, spurred me on to invent a story of love, sex, separation, and death. It is not based on any historical record-there isn’t one. But for the next three weeks, every day I sat at my Delhi desk and wrote.
#delhitourguide #delhiheritage #delhihistoricalplaces #delhi #delhicapitals #delhivisitingplacese #delhitourism #mehrauli #jamalikamali #lodhicolony #historicdelhi #historicaldelhi #historical #history #historyfacts