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March 3, 2005
The queen of streets
Text by Zia Mutaher, photography by Jamil Khan
If there ever was a queen amongst the streets of Karachi, it surely was and still remains, the famous Zaibunnisa Street once known as Elphinstone Street or Elphi for short.
It is named after Mountstuart Elphinstone who was Governor of Bombay from 1819-27 and was fluent in Persian and Sanskrit. In 1809, he was sent on a mission to Kabul. The mission ended up with the death of 4,500 British and Indian soldiers and 12,000 of their followers.
As Governor of Bombay, he sanctioned Rs5,000 for repairs of Thatta’s Jama Masjid and tombs. Perhaps it was this benevolence which has kept his memory alive in the minds of many old Karachiites. The street named after him passes through the centre of Saddar.
In his book The unplanned revolution, architect and development activist, Arif Hasan writes, “The Saddar quarter began as Saddar Bazaar in 1839. It was established as a shopping centre to serve the British military camp located between the bazaar and the walled city. After Karachi’s annexation in 1843, the camp was dismantled and the residents moved to more permanent accommodation, in the north and east of the bazaar.
“Saddar went on to develop as a commercial area, where the British officers and their wives would shop in a not too unfamiliar environment and where the latest fashions and products from ‘home’ were available.
“After the failure of the 1857 rebellion, the growth of Saddar gathered speed. It owed its development not only to the British policy of promoting trade but also to the pioneering spirit of first the Goan Christian, Hindu and Parsi and later the Muslim mercantile communities. They took an active interest in Saddar’s civic life and established many lasting institutions. The Goan and Parsi residential areas were inside the bazaar, while the European quarters were at its periphery.”
At independence, many important institutions run by the Church or the Goan and Parsi communities were located in the area. Schools, community halls, gymkhanas and libraries flourished side by side with bars, billiard rooms, Irani cafes for natives and posh tea rooms for their gora sahibs.
Pir Ali Mohammad Rashdi, describing the Saddar of his youth maintained that no badly dressed man would dare to enter the bazaar, even as late as the 1930s. It was a place of intellectual assembly and sophisticated English styled shops.
In The dual city: Karachi during the Raj, architects Yasmeen and Mihail Lari state, “The first street transformed into an imposing thoroughfare due to the efforts of the native mercantile community was Elphinstone Street. The first native edifice of architectural significance to appear was the Nusserwanjee Building built by Jamshed Nusserwanjee Mehta, a Parsi trader (who was mayor of Karachi and was known as the maker of modern Karachi).”
Nusserwanjee Building was followed by others such as Mohammad Ali Building that originally housed Hajee Dossul and Sons, a large department store, Old Illaco House which initially belonged to the Indian Life Assurance Company and the Victoria Furnishing Mart where the famous Haydn and Company — piano manufacturers and importers of musical merchandise — were lodged.
The historic Nusserwanjee edifice has recently been relocated at the site of the Indus Valley School of Art & Architecture in Clifton, giving rise to a heated debate about the ethics of isolating historical structures from their unique holistic setting. Some other structures, for example, the Bliss and Company building (built in 1919) have met with a worse fate having been demolished altogether.
Over the years the city itself has expanded beyond measure, new residential areas have come up and shopping malls have sprouted all around. But Zaibunnisa alias Elphinstone Street has retained its charm as the shopper’s paradise. From watches and sunglasses to perfumes, designer shirts and shoes, it offers you the best that your wallet can buy. All you need to do is take an evening stroll, down this historic lane. Its shopfronts adorned with colourful lights, look like a queen decked up in all her regal splendour, truly ‘the queen of streets!’
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