Writer, Director, Actor Sohaila Kapur reflects on childhood memories, family legacy, and the uncertain future of Delhi Gymkhana Club, weaving together personal nostalgia, social history, and the pain of multiple farewells in a changing India.

It’s the time for goodbyes. To an ancestral home, one’s birth city, one’s close friends, and one’s favourite institution. Goodbyes always happen, but never in such a cascade. One feels the burden of these farewells. It’s time to look back and remember with gratitude.

In the past few years, I have lost many classmates. Am shifting out of our ancestral home, built brick by brick by my hardworking, penny-saving parents, who were refugees from Pakistan as young adults. I may have to shift to another city, abandoning the city of my birth, one that made me what I am today. And now, a nostalgia-ridden, sorrowful farewell to the institution that contributed a large part of the happy times I have experienced here.

Growing Up at Delhi Gymkhana Club

The Delhi Gymkhana Club is where I grew up. It was the first sign of success, the feeling of having arrived in life, when my paediatrician father got his membership. He was one of the early ones, his number being 193. But it was already a sought-after club with its elegant buildings and significant history.

I visited it yesterday. It was a Thursday. A night before the initial government deadline of June 5, to vacate the place before its take-over. The club was choc-a-block with members across generations. One couldn’t find a seat. People were approaching those they didn’t know, smiling, willing to mix. Very unusual for the members, who generally preferred their own groups. One could see it was a kind of farewell and also the resolve to fight it out, though no one expressed it. People just stayed close to one another, chatting, trading jokes, dancing, well aware that these nights may be limited. A palpable sadness that was clothed by an expression of gay abandon.

It made me think: what if its illustrious neighbour, the PM (he shares a wall with the club), was invited to this celebration? He could see what a huge community would be rent asunder. But perhaps that is the very idea. To rend asunder a lifestyle that he believes is, or should be, redundant. Never mind if most of the members are retired civil servants or ex-members of the armed forces, who adopted this lifestyle post active service to the nation, for their mental and physical health.

Memories Around Every Corner

For me, there were so many memories that came flooding back. On any ordinary day, I would take the visit in my stride. But today was special. It suddenly brought my relationship to the club into sharp focus. I took in every detail of its polished and chandeliered interiors with affection and nostalgia. Touching the refurbished texture of the old sofas brought tears to my eyes. The memories of my parents and the club became inextricable.

Standing in the majestic 96-year-old ballroom, with its polished wooden floor and the brass-plated admonishment not to walk over it, I smiled. The women’s washroom, with the ‘Children Not Allowed’ signage that was ubiquitous in the club those days and evoked resentment in us children, was now redolent with fond memories of dodging those restrictions and attempting to enter in any case. A thrilling escapade that invited envy from less adventurous pals.

I remembered my father sitting by the fireside (before it became electric) and ordering his favourite chicken sandwiches, while my mother ordered her pot of tea. Sundays were always at the club. Me swimming in the 95-year-old swimming pool, The Lady Willingdon Swimming Bath 1931 (as its headmast read… now gone). My father, in his woollen blue trunks, egging me on to jump from the diving board (now gone). I remember him shouting ‘Jump!’ from the shallow end, embarrassing me into plunging clumsily into the water to avoid heads turning in my direction.

That was his trick to make me do it, and it worked!

The Swimming Pool Years

I remembered gathering my courage and tremulously climbing the topmost board, gearing up to jump into the blue waters below that looked like they were a great distance away! And many years before that, the stone-floored baby pool, where I splashed everybody around. The stone fountain, where I measured myself every year to ascertain how many inches I had gained, exulting the day I could see the top. Ordering ice cream from the adjoining kiosk (still there) or wolfing down fish fingers and chicken sandwiches hungrily after a swim.

I distinctly remember a case of boyish wickedness when two white boys dunked me in the water and nearly drowned me. I avoided all foreign children in the pool after that! I remember peeing in the pool and then fixing the expression on my face so I wouldn’t be caught. As also jumping between each column into the pool, in that colonnaded sanctorum.

Diving under the water when the plump waiter rang the bell for the children to leave the pool, or the skinny, betel-chewing, friendly ayah and later her replacement, a bonnie 18-year-old shrew (the next generation!), who shooed me out of the pool at the appointed time. I remember when hairbrushes and face powder were kept on the dressing tables for mums to use after swims, and me powdering my face much to the amusement of the betel-chewing ayah.

A Home Away From Home

Lunches were in the large, green Kashmir lawns, with a spread of cuisines. Initially, there were no counters and you had to do your ordering. Food would come directly from the kitchen. Or you could go to the main dining hall and the smaller Kashmir Lounge, take your seat and order there.

Eventually, over the years, with the growth in the membership and the entry of professionals and businessmen, the cuisine counters from the West, the Far East and the Middle East appeared. Many years later, a Chinese room and a CCD were also added. Food was delicious. But my favourites were always the fresh juices, nimbu pani and the assortment of ice creams. It was a gastronomic indulgence, after which everybody went home and slept.

Many seniors used the library and reading rooms and played billiards, while the youngsters (me included) played tennis, squash, TT or badminton. Years later, a room was added in the ladies’ cloakroom (maybe even in the men’s) with four beds, where one could rest in the afternoons.

In the evenings, the bars would come alive with music and merriment and dancing to a live singer or band, once or twice a week. Then there was a bank and an ATM for those who wanted to avoid the rush. It was the perfect home away from home for seniors and empty nesters who would spend the entire day there and enjoy the evening with friends. It was a sure method of giving them a quality life at an affordable rate.

What Happens Next?

Though the members are fighting in the High Court to retain their club, I do wonder that if and when the government takes over, what would they do with the property?

Some say they will demolish it, as they are all remnants of the Raj. The club’s original design and structure were envisioned by British architect Robert Tor Russell, who also designed the Connaught Place complex, Teen Murti House, Western & Eastern Courts, Safdarjung Airport (originally Willingdon Airfield), National Stadium (now the Major Dhyan Chand National Stadium) and Pataudi Palace (also known as Ibrahim Kothi).

Are they next on the list?