Mirza Ghalib, who lived through the siege of Delhi in 1857, wrote haunting accounts about Delhi’s desolation after the power shift. In a letter to one of his friends, Ghalib wrote: “Bhai, kya poochte ho? Kya likhoon? Dilli ki hasti munasir kai hungamon par thi, Qila, Chandni Chowk, har roz ka bazaar-e-Jami Masjid, har hafte ki sair-e-muna-e-Jamuna, har saal ka mela Phool-walon ka. Yeh paanchon baatein ab nahin. Phir kaho, Dilli kahan? Haan, koi sheher qalamrow-e-Hind mein is naam ka tha.” (Delhi meant the Fort, the Chandni Chowk, the daily bazaar near Jama Mosque, the weekly trip to the Jamuna Bridge, the annual Fair of the Flower-sellers. These five things are no more. Where is Delhi now? Yes, there used to be a city of this name in the land of Ind[ia].)§Mob violence and destruction are not new to India’s electoral history, especially after large-scale power shifts. Over the years, since the Partition in 1947, the country has witnessed large-scale bloodshed and riots; yet somehow, the hyper-masculine urge to inflict a physical dent in public spaces through destruction and vandalism remain unchanged. It is as if one has not fully won until one’s impunity is tested on the ground through acts of rampant violence.Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) leader Suvendu Adhikari, who said, “Entire Muslim vote went to TMC; I will work for Hindus,” was sworn in as the ninth chief minister of West Bengal on May 9.On May 4, the BJP came to power with a resounding majority; soon after, the rage and violence of a ‘triumphant crowd’ gripped the streets of ‘new’ Bengal. Some of the most populated and thriving streets of Kolkata suddenly shut down to silence; flashing back the memories of many curfewed nights the city had seen in the past.Several incidents of deaths, vandalism, destruction, communal intimidation and ‘Bulldozer Parades’ have already been reported, suggesting how the situations may remain volatile in the coming months in many places across the state.Who bears witness to these vulgar, unbridled displays of violence? To the undoing of a city? Is it the people attacked by the mob, or those who can scroll past the violence without being affected? Is it the two friends now fighting over an alien ideology they never grew up with, or the elderly woman with a bleeding head who has inhabited the land since before the birth of this nation? Is it the shattered spaces, or the broken objects?The following images are diary entries from this unprecedented time in the ‘new’ Bengal.