Wings of the dove

We appear at their doorstep without warning in late September, and Yusuf Nachij, the pigeon owner, is not home. His brother Shafi invites us to haul ourselves up into their house and on to their balcony, where the family pigeons perch, some in airy cages, others in wooden boxes with sliding glass fronts, left partially open. Here they coexist—we counted six of varying sizes and hues—with potted plants, clotheslines, a Tata Sky dish, as well as their human family, and settle unperturbed into the hands of a visiting uncle to pose for the camera, clearly acclimatized to human eccentricity.

“It’s an enthusiasm of my brother’s," Shafi explains to us. He uses the Urdu word “shauq". “Our father and grandfather used to keep pigeons too."

Slideshow | Wings of the dove

Pigeons thrive in human habitats because they find food in abundance. Urban constructions, like this one, also allow them to roost at heights, where predators like cats cannot get at them

At the GPO kabutarkhana on Mint Road, passersby of all ages stop to feed grain to hundreds of pigeons that flock here in the daytime, for religious or spiritual reasons

At Mint Road there are sometimes so many pigeons taking wing that the air is thick with their feathers

A favourite tourist pose at the Gateway of India: pigeon-feeding in the shadow of the Taj Mahal hotel.

This photographer, who gives his name as Pintu, is part of the small pigeon economy that has sprung up at Apollo Bunder, catering to pigeon-loving tourists who want Bollywood-style pictures with the birds

the effects of Handry Lewis, chana-seller at the Gateway of India who has been selling pigeon feed to tourists for twenty years.

At Dadar Kabutarkhana, one of the oldest and largest in the city, a child sends up a shower of grain. Photographs by Gopal MS/Mint

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For many Mumbaikars, grateful for the existence of pigeon-proofing at home and fibreglass at work, pigeon-shauq is inexplicable. Having thrived in urban India in recent years, the rock pigeon is one of the few species which can compete with the city’s human population for ubiquity. Long after sparrows and mynahs have given up trying to survive electromagnetic waves, pollution and the disappearance of trees, pigeons have peaceably gone about the business of surviving and multiplying.

“In homes they’re considered pests, while commercial properties mostly want to get rid of them for aesthetic reasons," explains Joshua Rao, general manager, marketing, of Mumbai-headquartered Pest Control (India) Pvt. Ltd. Rao estimates the firm’s bird-proofing business at around ₹ 10 crore annually, with demand more or less constant over the last five years.

To pigeons, air conditioners are vents from which to bring forth fledglings that will achieve adulthood in 30 days. High-rises are roosts whose height prevents possible predators, like cats, from accessing their nests. Most of all, Mumbai’s humans have made generous neighbours.

“The main reason for pigeons thriving here is that food and breeding areas are abundant," says Asad Rahmani, director, Bombay Natural History Society. “There is no scarcity of nesting sites for them, and they are not afraid of human beings. Pigeons flock to cities all over the world. You find great hordes of them in Delhi, in London, in Leningrad. They are never found in big numbers in nature, but in human habitats, they don’t have many predators."

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Human beings seem anxious to be on their best behaviour around pigeons. It’s like posing for a family album—quite literally so at Apollo Bunder, where generations of Hindi movies featuring people skipping through flocks of pigeons has given rise to a microeconomy of chana (Bengal gram) sellers and tourist photographers. “Little bit closer," they encourage tourists who want pictures of doves eating out of their hands with either The Taj Mahal Palace hotel or the Gateway of India in the background. “Why don’t you bend down a little so that they can reach your hand—yes, perfect."

But local pilgrims are just as anxious to propitiate pigeons at the kabutarkhanas that dot busy junctions throughout Mumbai. “It’s a tradition that Gujaratis, especially Hindus and Jains, brought with them when they came to this city," explains Vivek Brahmbhatt, who runs the 110-year-old grain store Gokaldas and Sons on Mint Road, opposite the General Post Office. “They symbolize peace, they’re considered sacred."

From 6am-7pm, every day, Brahmbhatt, standing behind tall sacks of jowar, corn and chana, does brisk business selling grain by the rupee to passers-by who feed pigeons at the Mint Road kabutarkhana. At this junction, just behind Chhatrapati Shivaji Terminus, pigeons, flapping around the high iron fences of an old three-cornered enclosure, can block out the sun. The air is thick with feathers and the sweetness of digested protein. It is a benevolent daylight reiteration of the nightmare in Alfred Hitchcock’s The Birds.

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