New Delhi: Ishamudin Khan never thought his art would vanish from the streets. The 52-year-old, third-generation street magician learnt the esoteric skills when growing up and toured the globe enthralling people with this sleight of hand. He always believed this work would bring him enough money to give his family a good life. But he lives today with his five family members in a one-room house without a kitchen or toilet at the Kathputli Colony transit camp at Anand Parbat.
Like Khan, many other street artists are living in the transit camp — an enclave of conjurers, snake charmers, acrobats and puppeteers — while their slum colony is redeveloped, which, of course, has now been years in the making. Like Khan, they are all trying to keep their skills relevant enough to be able to feed their families.
More than 2,000 families live in the transit camp. All these families lived in the well-known Kathputli Colony. The colony was demolished in 2017, and the residents were moved to transit camps till the new flats were constructed. In October, TOI had reported that after missing several deadlines, Delhi Development Authority’s in-situ slum redevelopment project at Kathputli Colony would be completed soon. Officials had said the allotment of 1 BHK flats to eligible original inhabitants of Kathputli Colony at the multi-storey apartment complex in Shadipur, near Karol Bagh, was likely to start by December.
In the meantime, the survival instinct has pushed Khan to try his hands at stand-up comedy. “The rich culture of street art has almost disappeared across the country. Stand-up is the newest form of entertainment, which is why I am trying to write jokes in both Hindi and English to be performed simultaneously with my magic show,” revealed Khan.
However, for someone who hasn’t received a formal education and comes from an economically weaker section of society, finding his feet in the comedian circles hasn’t been easy. “These are elite circles. There are a lot of costs involved, which I am not able to afford,” Khan said, adding bitterly, “I want to continue to perform on the streets, but the law does not allow this. Yet, the governments have made no efforts to help the artists. They think we are beggars and have corralled us into a slum to decay and disappear.”
Many of the artists have been forced to take up odd jobs for money. Others claimed that unemployment had pushed youngsters towards drug abuse.
On the narrow lanes lives puppeteer Puran Bhat, 70. On a winter afternoon, he is on a mat outside his one-room house making a new kathputli (puppet). A native of Rajasthan, Bhat has travelled to many countries showcasing Indian puppetry. “We became deprived of work at the time of the Covid pandemic and I currently have no income. But as an artist, I can’t sit idle, so I am making kathputlis for a Ramayan show for the time when I get work,” said the puppeteer.
Bhat’s extended family lives in the camp, but some of them had to forsake their traditional art. He said, “In the last few years, many folk arts went extinct. We are fighting poverty and starvation while trying to keep our art alive.” He added, “Hume paise nahi chahiye, platform chahiye bas (We do not want money, only a platform). But only if the government has intention will innovative ideas help preserve the folk art community.”
The puppeteer has a vision of Kathputli Colony becoming a global centre for Indian street heritage. “We could have a village-in-the-city, where the artists live, teach and perform. People could have come there to learn traditional skills, such as puppet-making, music, dance, acrobatics and crafts,” said Bhat.
Unfortunately, the reality is depressing. “Our children could have taken our art form to a next level. Instead, unemployment has driven them to substance abuse,” he murmured. Kamla, a middle-aged woman, shouted from her window, “The camp has become the hotspot for drugs. Very few young people have jobs, so most of them take drugs or sell them.”
Nearby lives acrobat Kailash Chand, 50, who feels his art form doesn’t have a future. “This is why I did not let my children pick up the skills,” he said. “My three sons play dhols at weddings. The work is seasonal for them, but at least it gets them some income.” Chand disclosed that they had been told they would live in the transit camp for two years, but that has now stretched to over six years.