Urban renewal in Varanasi seeks to ease the way for the yearly multitude of pilgrims who visit this ancient city on the Ganges.

Workers demolish buildings in Varanasi's Lahori Tula neighborhood as part of a multimillion-dollar refurbishment project. Hundreds of thousands of pilgrims come to Varanasi every year.
Workers demolish buildings in Varanasi's Lahori Tula neighborhood as part of a multimillion-dollar refurbishment project. Hundreds of thousands of pilgrims come to Varanasi every year. © Paul Salopek

India’s holiest city, the Jerusalem of Hinduism, was clouded in dust—in powdered brick, in powdered mortar. A worker army pummeled the walls of the Lahori Tula neighborhood with sledgehammers and crowbars, leveling its twisted maze of alleys and lopsided buildings. One of the city's most timeworn districts lay bombed out amid heaps of rubble. At night, spectral trains of mules and horses saddled with baskets carted away ton after ton of debris.

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“Our master plan has changed,” Vishal Singh, the secretary of the Varanasi Development Authority, said of an ambitious new project to open pedestrian corridors for the hundreds of thousands of pilgrims who visit Kashi Vishwanath, the city’s most sacred temple, every year. To ease that congestion, entire city blocks in Varanasi were being razed to make way for gardens, lavatories, shops. Dozens of hidden shrines, some dating back centuries, were being discovered as residents’ homes toppled.

“At first it was going to be a swath of clear, clean land,” Singh said. “But we began finding smaller temples. Now all of these will be accessible by a complex of lanes.”

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To ease congestion, entire city blocks are being razed to make way for gardens, shops, and walkways.
To ease congestion, entire city blocks are being razed to make way for gardens, shops, and walkways. © Paul Salopek