From Sehar Khan to glamour of sequins, know all about the making of Eid Mubarak

The Sehar Khan: Of old streets and traditions

It's 3am and the old houses of Delhi's Nizammuddin area are covered in wrinkleless silence. The streets are empty, except for a few strays, who guard their kingdom with great gumption. But if you look carefully, you will see one other figure, trudging through the bylanes, preparing himself for the night's duty of waking up the neighbourhood for sehri (pre-dawn meal), a task he had taken upon himself some 16 Ramzans ago.

Meet Habib Ullah Khan, who, at 62, goes by the alias Habib Banarasi, an ironic reference to the life he left behind in Varanasi, where his days once revolved around weaving sarees, a wife and four children. Dressed in a checked dhoti, skullcap and a kurta far too big for his frame, it is somehow easy to imagine Khan's whimsical entry into Delhi's Hazrat Nizamuddin Dargah, where he stayed on to fan the shrine of Sufi saint Khwaja Nizamuddin Auliya, later taking on the additional responsibility of a Sehar Khan. The morning call is a tradition that dates back to the time when people didn't have access to clocks or alarms and needed a familiar voice to wake them in time for Sehri. The men playing the role of Sehar Khan or El Misaharaty (in Arabic), would use dholaks or canisters to summon a new day. But Khan doesn't look out of place in the streets of Nizamuddin even today, and if he were, he's not bothered. “I don’t sleep during the nights in the month of Ramzan. I set out around 1.45am and visit every house in the basti,” he says contentedly.

Interestingly, despite his dedication, the dargah where Khan spends most of his time seems to be unaware of his service. “Yes, there used to be people who would call out to the neighbourhood for sehri, but not anymore, since we now use the siren. The first alarm rings at 3am followed by two more intimations at 15-minute intervals each,” says Syed Aziz Nizami, Sajjada Nashin and general secretary of Dargah Hazrat Nizamuddin Aulia.
With no recognition and barely any money, what keeps Khan walking these lonely streets? “I do it for Allah,” he smiles.

The night pancake man: Of chores sweet as chashni

Beads of sweat clinging to his blue kurta, Rajjab Ali sits on a makeshift slab outside Shalimar restaurant at Mumbai's Mohammad Ali Road, cracking eggs, two at a time. In front of the middle-aged malpua maker sits a big black kadai of chashni, that sweetens by the hour as dollops of flour batter is plunged into it, the fire turning them first golden, and then, a blushing brown. Ali has been making malpuas at the same spot for the last 10 years, young helpers fleeting in and out to give him a hand. You'd think he would need more help, considering that during Ramzan, business starts from 4 in the evening and goes on till sehri, at 4 in the morning. “Andazaan solaso (1,600) log toh aate honge Ramzan ke akhri kuch din se Eid tak. Bheed hamesha hota hain lekin shaam ke paanch baaje se 7 baaje tak itna rehta hain, line lagana padta hain (Approximately 1,600 people troop in between the last few days of Ramzan and Eid. It is crowded all the time, but demand peaks between 5-7pm, when customers have to queue up),” he says.

Do the long hours get to him? His proximity to the flames, the chaos of revellers — the noise and the sweat that surrounds him as he sits in his spot all night? Apparently not, because by his own admission, Ali likes nothing better than frying up a perfectly sweet, tolerably greasy malpua, the dry-fruit and malai wali aroma of which he knows will haunt the sidewalks until late morning. All for the price of Rs 150 per malpua. You could get a half, for Rs 120 too. But why would you?

The Eid special tailor: Of shararas and sequins

Move northwards from Mohammad Ali Road towards Kurla, and you'll find Sheikh Taufi perched on a stool, stitching up salwar kameez, chanya choli, anarkalis and shararas on a sewing machine. Taufi has been working with Perfect Tailors for three years, and the workload always shoots up through the roof around the time of Eid. “Par is time nahi, zyada tar Eid ka kaam Ramzan shuru hone se pehle hi khatam ho jata hain (We finish Eid-related tailoring work much before the holy month of Ramzan starts)," he says, re-emphasizing how serious an affair Eid ke kapde is, and how they cannot be trusted to be fashioned in the frenzy of the last few days. Even so, work does not seem to be sparse with a week to go for Eid, as Taufi sits surrounded by a sea of cotton, mulmul and georgette, moving only to pick up a tangerine-gold kurta and place it on the hanger in a line with the other finished items, many of which stand out for the bright lacework at their hems. The “simple suits” are tailored for Rs 300, “aastar wale ki (the ones with lining for) Rs 400” and anarkalis for Rs 900.

Ask if he manages to eat and sleep well given he has his hands full, and he shrugs, “Poori raat nahi, dukan bas dhai baje tak khula rehta hain. Waise bhi is saal utna zyada kaam nahi hain (The shop is open only until 2.30am. Anyhow, we've not received much tailoring work this year). All the same, if you try to linger on to steal a couple of photographs, you'd be greeted with an older, sterner voice floating out of the store room. “Koi photo woto ki zaroorat nahi hain” (No need to click photos)! But chances are good man Taufi would give employer uncle the slip and let you capture just one frame—his universe of chaos and colours—before heading back to finish what remains of his work.

The family: Of samosas and empathy

Bushra Khan doesn't mind the long weeks leading up to Eid al-Fitr. In fact, she waits for them. In Khan's family, the heart and the hearth start gravitating moonwards as early as fifteen days into Shaban—the month preceding Ramzan, according to the Islamic lunar calendar. It is around the halfway mark of Shaban that Khan and her parents start observing fasts to prepare the body and mind for the long days of Ramzan sans food and liquid, the month during which observing Muslims allow themselves just two meals — suhoor, before dawn, and iftaar, after sunset.

Part of a 24-building Muslim community in Mumbai's central suburb of Kurla, preparations are fairly typical in the hair and make-up artist's family. Yards of fine cotton purchased, designs finalised—chic for the daughter, embellished for the parents—the materials are bundled off to trusted tailors, who would get that neckline right and ready one week before Ramzan. At about the same time as the salwar kameez, palazzos, and lately, long kurtas with cigarette pants, troop in the month's reserve of kabuli chana, hara vatana, ginger, garlic, raw spices, butter, raisins and Rooh Afza. Over the next few days, spices are ground up, samosa skins fried with the fillings rolled out in batches and meat stocked up in modest amounts so the spring rolls and chicken cutlets make it fresh to the iftaar table. There's nothing extraordinary about the heaps of papayas and melons that sit in the refrigerator either—scouted out ripe from the local bazaar so they can be thrown into the daily fruit chaat.

What is special about the days rolling into Eid at the Khan household is the family's refusal to limit its interpretation to “fasting and feasting” alone. “Ramzan, for me, is more mental than physical. It is about training my mind to be conscious and empathetic—and my body, resilient,” explains Khan, who observed her first full fast (from sunrise to sunset) at the age of eight. To flesh out her convictions, Khan saves her zakat—the Islamic tax that encourages Muslims to donate 2.5 per cent of their savings to charity—on a monthly basis, rather than annually, during Ramzan, as prevalent. “Those in real need cannot wait for Ramzan to come around! The kid waiting for school admission, or the patient in need of medical assistance will have no use of the zakat if it doesn't reach them in time,” reasons Khan. To teach herself restraint, Khan has even stopped binging at iftars. “We don't do elaborate snack spreads anymore. One type of snack a day is the golden rule. We even have a head count for the samosas,” laughs Khan. But less samosas in your system should not amount to less sensitivity. “That's the goal. To observe the harder rules without losing touch with your softness. Observing Ramzan does not mean I get to snap at others, or be, what do you call it? Hangry! (angry because you are hungry)”

As the days close in, festive cheer begins to replace this purposeful solemnity. “A couple of days before Eid, you'll find me running around the house, applying mehendi on my mother or aunts' palms, soaking charoli seeds or chopping up dry fruits for the sheer kurma that Mummy prepares on Eid morning,” says Khan. It is the familiarity of these rituals, very often thrown open to neighbours and friends, that comforts the likes of Khan, whose understanding of religion is essentially underlined by reason. “Eid, simply, is about loving. After the prayers and the biriyani-butter chicken, what really stays with me are those few hours in the evening, spent in the company of a brother who flies in from Qatar and a married elder sister, who comes home to her family. As an adult, this makes up for the disappointment of not receiving Eidi like we used to as children.”

(With inputs from Heena Khandelwal)