It was my first visit to Delhi and didn’t really have an iota of idea about the city map, but reached my friend’s house without a single scratch on my body. I lived and worked in the city for months, all alone. Anything could have happened, really anything! According to my near and dear ones(living for years in Kolkata) I could have been murdered, raped or kidnapped but it (Delhi) spared me as it spares a whole lot of students and workers arriving at the city everyday with a hope of a better future. I still don’t know that how much Delhi satisfies the hope of betterment but one thing that I found utterly unwelcoming is the frightening notion we cultivate regarding Delhi’s security.

For me Delhi is a city where people never compromise with fashion or image. I fell in love with the broad and clean roads of the city that run deep green. A place crowded with stunning cars, elegant shopping malls, stylish people and boisterous bash. The only devils I found over there are the autowala’s and the landlords. In Delhi an auto is found everywhere to make your journey easy and comfortable. However, the visitors and newcomers better call off their plan to avail it, because if you do that instead, you will remember them (the autowalas) as long as Delhi come to your mind. They will charge you triple so that when you bargain and feel that he has settle down for less you are only paying him double of what should have been paid. The other encounter that is hard to wipe out from mind for an outsider in Delhi is the unavoidable ‘panga’ one has to take with his/ her proprietor.

Before I set off for the capital to join my Foundation I met a number of people who vehemently discouraged me to stay and work in Delhi. The impression Kolkata fosters about Delhi is- it is a city of devils. As usual the news channels bag the whole credit. A pile of murder, rape and robbery cases that pop in our dining and drawing rooms mostly after 11 p.m. are enough to convey that staying in Delhi is a challenge. The appointment letter of my first job was never a call for celebration; it was more a piece of paper that summoned confusing curves in my near one’s forehead. But I was desperate, more important it was my first job and a chance to live a life under no supervision so, I couldn’t let it go so easily.

It was my first visit to Delhi and didn’t really have an iota of idea about the city map, but reached my friend’s house without a single scratch on my body. I lived and worked in the city for months, all alone. Anything could have happened, really anything! According to my near and dear ones(living for years in Kolkata) I could have been murdered, raped or kidnapped but it (Delhi) spared me as it spares a whole lot of students and workers arriving at the city everyday with a hope of a better future. I still don’t know that how much Delhi satisfies the hope of betterment but one thing that I found utterly unwelcoming is the frightening notion we cultivate regarding Delhi’s security.

For me Delhi is a city where people never compromise with fashion or image. I fell in love with the broad and clean roads of the city that run deep green. A place crowded with stunning cars, elegant shopping malls, stylish people and boisterous bash. The only devils I found over there are the autowala’s and the landlords. In Delhi an auto is found everywhere to make your journey easy and comfortable. However, the visitors and newcomers better call off their plan to avail it, because if you do that instead, you will remember them (the autowalas) as long as Delhi come to your mind. They will charge you triple so that when you bargain and feel that he has settle down for less you are only paying him double of what should have been paid. The other encounter that is hard to wipe out from mind for an outsider in Delhi is the unavoidable ‘panga’ one has to take with his/ her proprietor.