If you catch Karishma Mehta on a typical working day, strolling down the Causeway or preparing to park herself at a vantage point at the Mazgaon dock, you might take her to be another yuppie art -enthusiast armed with a DSLR and an eye for Instagram-worthy frames. You couldn't be more wrong. At 23, Karishma is the brain behind the Facebook page Humans of Bombay, a very-desi re-imagining of American photo-chronicler Brandon Stanton's page Humans of New York, which, having spawned an universe of similar pages, is yet to see a rendition as authentic as Karishma's.
With 6,59,252 likes and counting, Humans of Bombay can be best described as a visual story parade, a virtual documentation of the strikingly real lives that unfold against the backdrop of this city. Or as Karishma would say, "the many worlds within the city". It's not hard to see what she means.
While one of the photo-feature narrates the poignant tale of an eighteen-year-old determined to get on with life after the sudden demise of her mother, another captures the innocence of three mini football-lovers who swear they are "best friends and in Class 1-C together". Home-makers, corporate climbers, cab drivers, flower-sellers, tourists and old-timers, the page appears to cull out an enchantingly odd mixed-bag of the city, and every one seems to have their own special story. How does that happen?
"99.9 per cent of the time, if I bump into a person who's willing to talk—and I don't force—I'll have something interesting to share. Everyone has something to say, I just have to make them comfortable enough to share it," says Karishma. But how does one strike a real chord with strangers hustling through the city that never sleeps? What convinces them to stop and connect? "It's simple. I genuinely want to know about them. What I get out of them are conversations, not interviews," she says.
Sometimes, when a person is on the edge, she reminds them that opening up could serve as an inspiration to someone who's going through a similar situation.
Of the youngest and the oldest Bombaikers ('Bombay' is closer home for her, not 'Mumbai') she's struck up conversations with, Karishma fondly remembers two three-year-olds fighting over their favourite superheroes (Hulk VS Batman) before resolving matters over a hug, a Parsi couple whose majestic love story unfolded over almost a century, and a couple of real wars. But not all tales are memoirs of grand happenings. Occasionally there's a teenage boy who gets chased by a rickshawallah when his female friend pokes the sleeping man and runs away; or the glass-half-full divorcee who, while unwilling to repeat "the same mistake (of marriage) twice", is willing to settle for a girlfriend with an approximate attractiveness quotient of 8. "People react to the exact same situation so differently," muses the woman who turned the "force behind things" in January 2014.
Things, as she blithely puts her work, have recently taken the form of a print collection of exclusive stories, titled Humans of Bombay:The Book. Currently excited to upgrade from her Nikon 60D to a Canon 5D Mark III, Karishma's also toying with the idea of video stories. As someone whose parents took a while to comprehend the passion that made her reject a traditional career, Karishma's own story is one of creative determination. This stubborn spirit is perhaps what she shares with the Bombay she calls home, one she can describe in five words.
Riveting, challenging, persistent, interesting...free-spirited.
These are the beautiful Bombays.
