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I could lie and tell you Nainital is still as pretty as the photographs sometimes make her out to be, and we could leave it at that. But beyond that, it is possible Nainital has given out more than she can afford to. Twenty years ago, my father would tell me that as a young man he would jump into the lake and swim around his boat.

The lake’s waters give Nainital life. In return, the town sends back its daily effluent and garbage. The noble mountains today stand sullenly under the weight of concrete construction. Construction on designated green belts was banned by the courts in the mid-90s. But you’re still allowed to build elsewhere. Or sell, like my family did with Long View. We hadn’t used our corner of the house much and I wasn’t going to inherit any of it but after my grandfather and I had finished packing up the last bedside table lamp, there wasn’t a home in Nainital to go back to.

But 20 years ago none of this was important. I had been sent to school in Nainital. And in time, Nainital turned into home.

Over the summer, when the schools celebrate their Founding Days, yesterday’s children go back. Loud bunches of now unfamiliar looking people sitting inside the Boat House club and talking about the old days.

The club had its old days too and my mother talks of when a gentler people would walk its wooden floors. The hardened old timers still come, standing around the bar in their peak caps. At the other end, young boys from the north Indian plains assemble in bandanas and Bermuda shorts. But they’re the ones the town so avidly woos. The tourists that the town needs to make a living.

But there are also the pleasant surprises. Last winter I stayed at the Grand Hotel, run by a lady who had been to school with my mother. The hotel burnt down in the 70s and permission to rebuild was granted only after the owners agreed to copy the original blueprint. Each year, the hotel shuts down for the winter in disregard of commerce.
Nainital seems far removed from the outside world even as it continues to invite its inhabitants in. The proprietor of Ram Lal and Sons, who sell tweed handmade in Kumaon, explained it to me when I told him that he looked as well as he had done 10 years ago. “Yes,” he said, “it’s why we live here.”

Nainital was discovered in 1841 by an Englishman named Baron. Before that, the locals left it alone, saying it was sacred and visiting the Naina Devi temple only as pilgrimage. Baron however wasn’t convinced. My junior school English teacher said Baron climbed to the top of a hill to get a better look at the lake. And from the top of the hill, as he looked down at the emerald lake, on the other bank he saw a tiger getting his drink of water.

Whenever I look down at the lake, I try to imagine that first day. Baron was less considerate. He took the local chieftain for a boat ride and then threatened to throw him overboard. The chieftain, who did not know how to swim, in exchange for his life, signed over Nainital to the Englishman.

In 1879, the north end of the lake and the Naina Devi temple were buried by a landslide. A new temple was built. The north end is today used as a car park and much too logically called The Flats.

This is a hill of old schools and homes built cleverly so that they get sunlight from early morning to late evening. Today, local horsewallahs walk you along the bridle paths, muttering inanities such as “Amitabh Bachchan studied here, Naseeruddin Shah there”. So did Jim Corbett. His family home, Gurney House, can still be seen and there is talk of converting it into a museum.

The Nainital zoo is nicely kept (by zoo standards). I went there last winter. I stopped in front of an eagle, which moved from one end of the cage to the other, looking terrified. The cage was obviously too small.

Just like Nainital, a mighty heart beaten into submission over time.

But you never know. The Boat House club has put up a new signboard these days, asking you not to enter if you’re wearing shorts.