Jer Mahal: Through the looking glass

Jer Mahal has straddled Kalbadevi Road and JSS Road in chaotic Dhobi Talao for more than a century. Its European design harks back to a time when the British ruled over India—look all the way up to its trellises that display Gothic-arched top windows and intricate carvings crowning the building. Jer Mahal also borrows heavily from vernacular motifs such as the red-bricked roof and the in-filled louvred windows. "The building is one of the finest examples of the chawl system built in the vernacular style prevalent in the 19th Century," write Sharada Dwivedi and Rahul Mehrotra in their seminal book, Fort Walks.

In spite of its sagging condition today, Jer Mahal is packed cheek-by-jowl with shops. Its ground floor is awash with hoary Mumbai institutions: Kyani's Irani cafe, L.M. Furtado's music store, Bombay Sports. Perched on the upper floors are Kashmir Hotel, Great Punjab Hotel and a handful of Goan kudds (clubs). These cheap boarding houses were set up a century ago by Goa residents for young men who came from villages to Mumbai in search of jobs. Each kudd has a statue or a picture of the village patron saint, however, football fever has now overtaken the annual feast and the number of members present at the evening rosary has dwindled.

Hungry members can prepare food in the kudd's kitchen. In Bomoicar, a book on the Bombay Goans compiled by Reena Martins and Edgar Silveira, carves out an entire chapter on the hot bangda curry prepared by Anton, in one such club. "At Anton's," Silveira writes, "there was neither fork nor spoon and we ate standing—cheap white china in one hand and fish deboned with the other."

Today, this Grade III heritage structure is being threatened by demolition. With many of Mumbai's old structures tottering on the brink of destruction, can the city's history survive yet another hammering?