So, my work is based on B-Boying, which is a street dance form, in Delhi, it was adopted in 2002 by the street kids from west Delhi and slowly, traveled to the other parts of Delhi.

Inside Mananjay Prakash

My story is based on a Musician, his name is Mananjay Prakash, he lives in C.R park (New Delhi) with his mother and younger sister.

He plays at gigs for his earnings, in a day he plays at two places and the duration of performance is 3 hours, he doesn’t find it a stable way of earning, his sister also plays gigs and they both help their mother financially.

He did his schooling from Air Force Bal Bharti Lodhi road and used to participate in school competitions a lot he was introduced to music at a very young age.

“My dad used to listen to Ohso music when I was young so music was always there in the environment”

-Mananjay

His dad had old castes of songs which he used to listen for hours, he said that “music can also be learned by hearing songs and then practicing”, After marriage, his mom was doing theatre in the speared time from her job.

“When Manan was young, I used to take him with me while I was traveling for my theatre performances, I guess maybe that influenced him and exposed to arts”

-Mananjay’s mom

His mom also owned a dubbing studio, which was their source of income for some time, after which Mananjay started learning guitar, he used to bunk classes in school and attended western music classes.

He wants to get a proper education in music, after school, he wanted to join Swarnabhoomi Academy of Music in Chennai but could join it, though after graduation he completed a semester from Global Music Institute Noida.

He is a self-learned vocalist and he wants to teach also, he feels teaching is respectable and after learning properly one can teach also and teaching could be a stable way of earning where he can also focus on his own music, he says

“As an artist creating own work is important and it is the only thing which satisfies him, money can only help him but being creative and making own work is what he prefers’’

-Mananjay

He taught his sister guitar, piano, and singing, his sister also plays gigs and she is a painter too, she also self-learned painting and discovered her own genre.

As a musician practice is very important and after waking up the first thing, he do I either play guitar or piano he feels it helps him stay connected with music every time.

He is currently playing at different cafes in a day on a contract of playing 2 days in a week, for which he has to travel a lot, right now he is trying to collect enough money to invest properly on his studies and to get time for focusing on studying music, and after that start teaching, he used to teach before but he feels that he himself should get theoretical knowledge first, he is interested in jazz music now and wants to explore other genres too.

This slideshow requires JavaScript.

Yamuna is the sister of yama the god of death and it is believed that flowing the ashes after dead ones in the river is the last step of salvation, cremation and many rituals happen here on the coast of the river.

since a long time people live on the ghats, ghats are the platforms on the coast of the river where people were settled as it’s was along the river and they had a good source of water, you can see these stairs to the river this are few steps made to get in to the river and use the river water for daily needs kids used to bath there and they still do according to the records Yamuna is highly polluted and it contains toxic chemicals, Yamuna is no more a river it is a drainage now.

People there do the basic rituals of cremation  for the people who don’t have money to do it in the shamshan ghat so this gets the families there bread and butter, their source of income is generated from the ghat they do the rituals, These ghats are similar to those in Benaras and is an attraction for tourist so they take them in the boats and give them a tour, it’s insane that a river which is so polluted and on one side people are debating about it’s pollution tourists also prefer to come there because in a era like this where we are so developed it’s the only place you can find peace it’s a different world in these city.

Delhi has 72 ghats they don’t have any name but in Kashmiri gate there is a place called yamuna bazar , on ghat no 24 Ganesh lives with his family, his grand parents settled here, he lives with his mother his brother his sister and his nephew, this place is on rent and people here to survive sell fruits, flowers, prasad, and practice diffrent occupations.

Ganesh is a boat man and he does all the cremation rituals here, Yamuna is a river of life and death and it’s the same with the families who live on the ghats.

Through my work i’m trying to show how people believe in mythologies and rituals, how the lives of the people who are living on the ghats are connected to the river and how they are surviving, how there is a difference in the ideologies of the different people as people come there for rituals and people come the for photoshoot also it’s not a place for rituals anymore, its much more then that.

Thanks for joining me!

Good company in a journey makes the way seem shorter. — Izaak Walton