He chases djinns

Photographer Taha Ahmad knows the djinns like he knows his family In the oldworld neighbourhood of Agha Meer Deorhi in Lucknow where he grew up these supernatural entities or geniesmdashwhich according to the Islamic theology are created out of smokeless firemdashhave pervaded the consciousness of its residents since time immemorial ldquoEvery home in the locality has had a tryst with the djinnsrdquo Ahmad shares in a telephonic interview The area itself is steeped in historyOnce said to be the residence of a nawab named Agha Meer it was taken over by the East India Company which minted silver and built stables for their horses here By the time Ahmadrsquos great great grandfather bought a home and moved in somewhere in the late 19th century the neighbourhood was already overrun by djinnsMen and women who visit Feroz Shah Kotla in New Delhi every Thursday to receive the djinnsrsquo blessings seen sitting across the large stairs of the 14th century fortress These stairs are built parallel to the fortressrsquo mosque and the underground tunnel leading to the dark alcoves and niches where the genies are said to resideldquoThe walls of most of the homes in Agha Meer Deorhi have niches As a child I was told that the djinns resided here and that they werenrsquot to be disturbed We would also light incense sticks and place them inside these nichesrdquo Ahmad says He also remembers being told not to go to the roof after the dark and to avoid keeping any furniture in the middle of the aangan or courtyard of their home ldquoas itrsquos a passage for the djinns and it could obstruct their pathrdquo Two people on different occasions had even seen a ghostly figure making its way into Ahmadrsquos room on the top floor of their twostorey home Since theirs is a practising Muslim family nobody thought these encounters or sightings to be strange ldquoThe Quran makes a mention of the djinns good as well as evil So we came to believe in the existence of a parallel world where they livedrdquo he addsWhen Ahmad moved to Delhi in 2012 to pursue Fine Arts from Jamia Millia Islamia the stories of djinns continued to follow him A few years later a chance meeting with Anand Vivek Taneja who at the time was working on the book Jinnealogy Time Islam and Ecological Thought in the Medieval Ruins of Delhi led him to the Firoz Shah Kotla fortress built by the ruler Feroz Shah Tughlaq in the 14th century where amidst the ruins djinn worship was being performed ldquoEvery Thursday thousands of people from all walks of life gathered here praying writing letters pasting coins lighting candles and lamps to impress the djinns in exchange for a better liferdquo says Ahmad ldquoIt intrigued merdquo But the more Ahmad visited the place the more hersquod come to realise how far removed this practice was from his own understanding of the djinns that resided in his hometown Taha Ahmad Pic CourtesyKushal KapoorA middleaged woman whom he encountered during one of his visits to the fortress believed that the only reason her loved ones were ldquohale and heartyrdquo was because she has been visiting the fort every Thursday for the last 20 years Another family told him how Sulaiman a selfproclaimed godman who visited the fort declared that the familyrsquos wishes and yearnings would be entertained in the court of the djinns depending upon how hefty an amount theyrsquod pay him Intimate letters that devotees would write to the djinns where theyrsquod share their problems make open confessions or seek intervention would be pinned on the alcoves of the stone walls in the fort only to be later collected and burnt or dumped in the garbage bin ldquoThe practice had become a moneymaking mechanism for the godmen in the fort who were exploiting the misfortunes of uneducated and unaware faithfulrdquo he addsThe experience led Ahmad to document this ldquomystical forcerdquo which was very much part of his upbringing but had come to be dogged by superstition and fallacy The result is a photo project A Displaced Hope which has been over five years in the making and will be showcased starting September 18 at Vantage Point Sharjah 9 the ninth iteration of Sharjah Art Foundationrsquos annual initiative dedicated to the medium of photography ldquoI began in 2015 by photographing everything that I was witnessing at the fortress of Firoz Shah Kotla What was happening there was in absolute contradiction to what I was raised to believe about the djinns and the teachings I had received from my parentsrdquo he shares After two years of continuous shooting Ahmad remembers nearly giving up on the project ldquoas I wasnrsquot getting anything concrete out of itrdquo when he turned homewards for inspiration ldquoI started photographing my home and neighbourhood while revisiting my own memories and the stories that I had grown up hearing I started getting a better understanding of the beliefrdquo Around the same time he received The Documentary Project Fund 2017 becoming the first Indian to receive the US grant which enabled him to continue his workDjinn wali Masjid as it is called is more than a centuryold mosque situated in the Agha Meer Deorhi area of Lucknow According to people of the area the mosque has been the residence to djinns since a long time Thus closed and abandonedThe project is a lesson in contrast On the one hand is Agha Meer Deorhi where djinns are an invisible force moving softly and subtly through its gullies and old houses made of Lakhori bricks and on the other is Firoz Shah Kotla where itrsquos more brutal and perceptible a force created by godmen and clerics which is both feared and revered A few years ago neighbours at Agha Meer Deorhi found this boy who was five years old then fallen from the Djinn wali Masjidrsquos roof bleeding profusely The fall cost him his right eye Rumour has it that he was playing on the roof and allegedly urinated in the mosquersquos vicinity People believe he was thrown from the roof by the djinnsAhmad remembers taking a picture of a centuryold mosque in his locality unpopularly known as Djinn wali Masjid as it was said to be possessed by two families of djinns ldquoPrevious caretakers have complained about being harassed by a lsquopresencersquo inside the premises and itrsquos one of the reasons why it has been abandonedrdquo he says A Muslim family in the area which built a room that abutted one of the walls of the mosque saw four deaths after they didnrsquot pay heed to a dream by a family member In the dream a bearded man in white had warned them against the construction ldquoThe room was left unfinished after thatrdquo says Ahmad Itrsquos not just Muslims in the neighbourhood who pay obeisance to the djinns The Agarwals of Agha Meer Deorhi have also encountered the paranormal ldquoThey are a family of merchants During my interviews they shared how theyrsquod bring spices and wheat that theyrsquod store in the basement It would go stale overnight They believe that they lost two brothers because the djinns were unhappy with them The family even got pandits to perform havans and maulanas to recite the Quran but the activities didnrsquot stop It was only after they lsquoapologised to the djinnsrsquo for a mistake they felt that they committed that things started looking up for themrdquo Ahmad says he did a series of staged and candid shoots in the area to bring alive these storiesA girl stares from behind a broken glass window pane in her room in Lucknow which was left unfinished due to the occupancy of the djinns Her house witnessed four deaths due to the supposed ignorant behaviour of the residents who kept constructing the room despite supernatural happeningsAt Firoz Shah Kotla he was able to capture disturbing rituals associated with djinn worship after he had befriended the clerics and godmen who gave him a peek inside this world of theirs The djinns they claimed lived in the poorlyventilated batinfested tunnels below the fortress where Ahmad has seen many an exorcism being performed ldquoDuring exorcism the women would be brutally treated and manhandled As the ritual progressed these lsquopossessed womenrsquo would speak in a tone very different from their own original voicerdquo he shares The ldquogodmenrdquo would tell the family how the djinn possessing them was a stubborn spirit ldquoThe women would cry scream scratch with their nails and bang their heads on the walls some lying unconsciously in the fortress I have also seen men get under the grip of such supernatural forcesrdquo he adds Ahmad feels that this ritual had little to do with djinns but the general unsettling atmosphere inside the dingy and dark tunnelsIn all these years of photographing these spaces he says he has never encountered a djinn A believer himself he admits to having mysteriously fallen ill on three occasions At one point after emerging from the tunnel he remained unwell for nearly a month ldquoMy family thought I should discontinue the project but it was distressing to see what was happening at Firoz Shah Kotlardquo says the awardwinning photographer While A Displaced Hope comprising black and white prints has been exhibited at Maribor Photo Festival in Slovenia Addis Foto Festival in Ethiopia Pier 2 Art Centre Kaohsiung Taiwan and Screened at Naples Italy by curator Mario Spada it is yet to see the light of day in India If and when it does Ahmad hopes that the venue will be the ruined fortress itself ldquoI want to hold the show on a Thursday when this practice takes place I hope my visuals will do the talking and that people will see the truthrdquo