Mumbai 1989

‘An extraordinary book that captures the Bombay of my youth.’ Barat Patel.


‘A little book but an important book for those who like to glimpse the past without in a way written and shown with no axe to grind.’ Dha Agarwal.


‘The best piece of writing about the Gateway of India I have come across.’ Raj Chakrabarti.


Landing in Mumbai for the first time, it was still called Bombay, a lingering and much despised legacy of British colonial rule.


What the colonial masters had left behind was a country that despite its riches was wracked by a poverty beyond my imagination. I had been told to expect this but was still shocked by its extent. Now I understood why people I knew who had come here, fell into two camps: those who loved the place, and those who, having visited once, never came again.


This was the late eighties. Despite the poverty this was the powerhouse of India: the financial centre, where most foreign companies set up their headquarters, the place where most exports and imports arrived, and home to Bollywood.


Most commonly international flights arrived in the dead of night and for the first time visitor there was little inkling of what the shadows and darkness would turn into once the sun rose. No matter what camp they would ultimately fall into they would be shocked just as I was.


I was in the camp of those who loved the place. After my initial visit to Mumbai I would then travel to the north and then down to Goa, and never once felt I had enough.


These photographs were taken on my first trip - now over thirty years ago. They are a record of what I found on the streets as I walked through the city. They represent a true image of what the city was like then, and looking back at them they conjure up many memories.


If this was the Mumbai you knew at the time, I hope they do the same. If you are visiting for the first time perhaps they will give you a sense of what the streets were once like and a flavour of what you might find.