Atariya, Angana, Chhat, Darwaza, Khidki

Romancing through the Window and Door

Mere saamnewali khidki mein October 5, 2021

Window opens the outside world to those inside. If a person from outside tries to look into a window, his view is very restricted. Because of this asymmetry, window creates many interesting possibilities. Since one can see on the sly, this is the best place for voyeurs. In Rear Window (1954), James Stewart, confined to […]

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Tujhe chaand ke ‘bahaane’ dekhun ki ‘chhat’ par aa ja goriye

Ude jab jab zulfein teri February 5, 2019

Today’s young generation would scarcely believe the stratagems the lovers in the earlier days had to adopt to set up a rendezvous. ‘Atariya’ was one favourite place going back to the days of Romeo and Juliet. As we have seen earlier, its vantage position at the back of the house made it an appropriate place […]

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Songs of Angana

Aanagn mein Upanayan October 19, 2016

We have seen in the songs of atariya how its vantage location at the back of a house makes it an ideal secret meeting point for the lovers. Aangan or angana, i.e. courtyard, on the other hand, is a central feature of the house. Open to the sky, and surrounded on the four sides by […]

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Songs of Atariya

Romeo and Juliet on Atariya February 12, 2014

With a tribute to Begum Akhtar in her Centenary Year I had thought songs of atariya are one of the things – like lori, bidaai songs, bhajan, piano songs etc. – that have been irredeemably lost from our films. Loosely translated as ‘balcony’, atariya was the place where the heroine would go stealthily from the […]

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