 Summary of this article
- Reza, a postgraduate student from Iran in Delhi for three years, says, “It’s a strange helplessness. You wake up in the morning and first thing you do is check the news."
- “My mother sends me poetry from Tehran, voice notes to tell me that they are okay, but I know they are not because I watch the news, too,” says an Iranian scholar living in Delhi.
- The spirit of the people of Iran is deeply rooted in religious and cultural teachings.
Maryam Alizadeh checks her phone first thing in the day for messages, missed calls, fragments of news from Iran. Some mornings, there is a message waiting. Most mornings, it’s just scrolling the social media for news. Alizadeh, a PhD scholar at Delhi University, three years into her research, lives in Delhi while her family remains in Tehran.
“We get all our news through the media and don’t know how much of it we can trust,” she says. “I have been in touch with my family, which includes my mother and sister in Tehran. I can tell you they are still alive. My house has been damaged, not destroyed. Many of my friends and relatives have been killed, including my pregnant cousin.”
Relief and grief sit together as she gets dressed and steps out into a day that feels ordinary.
Most afternoons, Alizadeh is at the Iranian Cultural Centre in south Delhi, a hub for the city’s Iranian community. She moves between students, scholars, business owners and long-time residents, keeping track of news from Tehran and checking on those struggling to cope. Many of the students here are on scholarships or are self-financed. The ongoing sanctions have made routine transfers unreliable or impossible, creating a quiet anxiety about finances on top of their worries about their families.
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“We are trying to arrange monetary help for those in difficulty,” she says. “As for the community living in India, we have stayed together, offering emotional support to each other... We try to be in constant touch with each other. It’s not just about money. It’s about being present.”
Outside the gates, a small table has been set up. On it rests a photograph of Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, framed by flowers. Some fresh, others beginning to wilt under the Delhi sun. People arrive one by one, or in small groups, approach slowly, place a flower, stand still for a moment and then step aside. There are no speeches, no instructions. |
