Lost Delhi landmark? Ruins beneath Modi Mill flyover may be 18th-century inn

Ruins near the Modi Mill flyover in Delhi are being examined as the lost Sarai Juliana. If notified as heritage, the site could restore a forgotten Mughal-era link to Dona Juliana Dias da Costa.

In Short

• The site includes walls, an arch, building fragments and a water-filled well
• Mathura Road once formed part of Sher Shah Suri's Sadak-e-Azam route
• The site also aided caravans with rooms, animal spaces and separate kitchens

Ruins beneath the Modi Mill flyover on Mathura Road in Delhi may be the remains of Sarai Juliana, an 18th-century travellers' inn built by Dona Juliana Dias da Costa, a Portuguese woman who held an unusual place in the Mughal court. The site, inside a green space maintained by the PWD, has sections of walls, an arched opening, fragments of an old building and a well that still holds water.

Dr Aqil Ahmed, member secretary of the MCD's Heritage Cell, said the civic body is planning to notify the structure as a heritage site. If that happens, it would give official recognition to a monument whose name survives in Sarai Julena in southeast Delhi's Okhla, even though the sarai itself was long believed to have disappeared.

Historical research says Juliana built the sarai in Okhla in 1720 during the reign of Muhammad Shah 'Rangeela' as a rest house for European travellers. This account appears in Juliana Nama, a book by former National Museum director Raghuraj Singh Chauhan and archivist Madhukar Tewari, who traced her life through French, Portuguese, Persian and Urdu sources.

Ahmed said the location itself is an important clue. Long before Mathura Road became an urban highway, it formed part of the Sadak-e-Azam, or Great Road, developed under Sher Shah Suri. The route ran through Peshawar, Lahore, Delhi and Agra towards Bengal, and later became the basis of the Grand Trunk Road. "For someone travelling in the 17th or 18th century, this was a journey across a vast and connected world. Travellers and caravans crossed the Khyber route towards Peshawar and Lahore before moving towards Delhi and Agra. Merchants, soldiers, officials, pilgrims and European travellers used the road network, carrying goods and possessions over distances that today are covered in hours but then took days," Ahmed said.

He said the road network depended on wells, trees, kos minars and sarais where travellers and animals could stop. "That is why the sarais were built on the main road. People travelling long distances needed a place to stay, and they also needed a place for their animals," he said. Ahmed said the sarai was a substantial establishment with at least 15 rooms, separate areas for animals and different kitchen arrangements for vegetarian and non-vegetarian travellers.

A circular well near the ruined walls is another clue. "The upper portion has been repaired with cement and covered with a metal grille, but the old lining survives and water can still be seen below. Hence, the well is one of the most important identifying factors," Ahmed said. The remains also contain Lakhori bricks, small, thin and flat bricks used widely in Mughal-period construction, along with irregular pieces of stone. Ahmed said the surviving construction and the old arch suggest the original building was much larger. "The arch work came from these bricks," he said.

Ahmed said the structure was part of an important chain of stopping places around Delhi. Arab ki Sarai near Humayun's Tomb is among the best surviving examples, while Sarai Kale Khan was another major stop on the southern approach. Azimganj Sarai, now inside the Delhi Zoo, also survives. "Other sarais, including those associated with Lado Sarai and Katwaria Sarai - the urban villages in south Delhi - were situated away from the main arterial route and therefore did not occupy quite the same position as establishments on the main road," he said.

Juliana Nama records differing accounts of Juliana's origins. One theory links her family to Portuguese prisoners captured at Hooghly after Shah Jahan's attack in 1632, another connects them to Cochin, and a third suggests she was associated with a Portuguese surgeon who came to the Mughal court. What the book does establish is the position she later held. A Christian Portuguese woman with medical knowledge, Juliana treated women of the royal household and was entrusted with the education of royal children, becoming a link between the Portuguese and Mughal courts. Among the princes taught by her was Muazzam, Aurangzeb's second son and the future Bahadur Shah I. According to the book, Juliana was 17 and Muazzam 18 when she became his tutor, and the authors write that the "seeds of a lifelong affair were sown" between them. The book also says she became jagirdar of four villages and received Dara Shikoh's residence in Delhi. By the time Muhammad Shah came to the throne in 1719, she had gained enough wealth and standing to build the sarai in Okhla in 1720. She died in Goa in 1734.

Ahmed said that in 1988, an MCD employee named Khalil used to sit outside the structure and issue birth certificates, when municipal services were run through sub-zonal offices closer to residential areas. Today, the site survives as fragments of brick, rough stone, a broken arch, collapsed walls and a well with water. Together, these remains may be the physical trace of the sarai that gave Sarai Julena its name and could now bring the forgotten monument back into Delhi's recorded heritage.

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