For two months the city suffers under the sullen eye of the sun. The heat rises up in clouds of steam from the roads and shimmers down from the skies. The populace swelters and mopes. Tempers run close to the edge, and appetites die.
These are the days of Coke and Pepsi. Heaven is a piece of tinkling ice. Nostalgic thoughts turn to cool fir-covered hill resorts in Himachal.
The pronouncements of weather pundits on Zee TV and Star TV often take precedence over all other news. "Monsoon reaches Bhopal," "Monsoon nears Agra," "Monsoon days away..." Like a tardy bridegroom's party, it advances, tarries and advances again.
No glass, no heart, no dawn breaks as the monsoon does upon Delhi. A sudden whiplash of lightning. A salvo of thunder. Old Connaught Place buildings rock on their heels. A crash, a peal and an echoing reverberation beyond the arrayed clouds shatters into a trillion prancing drops. Soothing, healing rain at last on the festering sores of summer.
Cloud upon cloud growls up to puncture itself on the jagged edge of lightning. The rumbling dies, decibel by decibel, as the rain comes pouring down. It flirts with the grass at India Gate. It sweeps into open windows, drenching those who have the audacity to be asleep during this moment when the orchestra of nature is playing to full glory. It leaks into ramshackle shanties and laughs to see Nehru Place office-goers scurry for shelter. It bathes the metro rail coaches on the elevated tracks until they appear like gleaming metal gods streaking through the grey and angry sky. A cluster of jubilant umbrellas blossom out and nod their welcome to the rains.
Next morning, the earth, newly washed, basks in the filtered sunlight. There is water 30 centimetres deep in parts of the city. The road below Minto Bridge is once again a lake...and is featured in front page photographs in both The Hindustan Times and the Times of India. Cars splutter, trains and buses run late, and at Palam flights are cancelled wholesale.
The monsoon has taken Delhi by storm again.
