Empress Market: a Karachi commerce icon built to bury ashes of a rebellion

Arab News

03-05-2025

KARACHI: In the heart of Karachi's Saddar neighborhood, the Empress Market stands as a towering relic of British colonial ambition, where the scent of fresh produce mingles with the sharp tang of spices, and shopkeepers hawk everything from live poultry to antique coins.
But few realize that underneath its ornate clocktower and gothic arches lies a darker, forgotten history that is stained by rebellion and retribution for those who took part in the 1857 uprising against British rule in the Indian Sub-continent.
It was at this site where the British executed scores of mutineers and their local sympathizers after they got to know of their plans and later constructed this magnificent market between 1884 and 1889 to prevent the place from becoming a commemorative site.
'The Empress Market building has a very unique architectural design, but apart from its design, its history is very interesting, which actually reveals why it was built in the first place,' Tania Ali Soomro, a Karachi-based architect, told Arab News this week, elaborating on the site's grim past.
'The rebels of the freedom struggle would be punished here. The method of punishment was such that they would be tied in front of cannons and then fired upon.'
The 1857 mutiny, also known as the Sepoy Mutiny, was a major uprising in India against the rule of the British East India Company, which began with a revolt by Indian soldiers of the Company in Meerut on May 10 that year and later spread to Delhi, Kanpur, Agra and Lucknow.
Though the uprising ultimately unsuccessful, it demonstrated the widespread discontent with British rule and paved the way for the rise of the Indian nationalist movement.
Historian Gul Hassan Kalmati notes in his book, 'Karachi — Glory of the East,' that following the failed rebellion, four mutineers, including Sooraj Bali Tivari and Ram Din Panday, were tied to the cannons and executed at the site of Empress Market.
Citing a confidential British document, titled 'Secret document number D/223/1857, dated 14th September 1857, Secret Branch,' Kalmati writes Tivari and Panday had led soldiers of the 21st Native Infantry Regiment, but two informants, Ram Bane and Lakhshman Gadari, alerted the British and thus failed the rebellion.
'The local people had started celebrating this place as a commemorative site. They would light oil lamps there and began to renovate it like a shrine,' Soomro said, adding this burgeoning memorial prompted the British to act.
'To erase this memory, the British decided to create something which is public and holds strong social value. As a result, the market was established at this location.'
In her book 'The Dual City: Karachi During the Raj,' Yasmeen Lari, a celebrated Pakistani architect, agrees with the notion.
'Although the imperialists were particular in commemorating significant events, it is not surprising that a plaque was not placed at the site of the Empress Market to mark the spot where native sepoys had been executed,' she writes.
The market was named in honor of Queen Victoria, the then Empress of India, with its Gothic architecture reflecting British authority with local adaptations.
'If we talk about the design, the architectural style of this building is Gothic, but it has been built in a somewhat localized and contextualized way,' Soomro said, adding the building was designed by James Strachan, who was an engineer.
'His distinct style, including linearity, pointed arch windows and the clock tower, can be seen across several buildings he designed, including DJ Science College and Sindh Madrasatul Islam [in Karachi].'
Lari describes the market as a 'very handsome building designed in what is known as the 'Domestic Gothic Style'.'
'While the use of the alien Gothic form was understandable, the presence of an atrium was highly unusual for the time,' she writes in her book.
'With a frontage of 231 feet on Preedy Street, its four galleries, each 46 feet wide, surround the generous size courtyard, 130 feet by 100 feet. The single-story building is not pretentious except for the tall central tower that rises to a height of 140 feet.'
The market was so beautiful that while praising it, Commissioner Pritchard had said that the 'only one other market [that] surpassed it in the whole Presidency was the 'Crawford Markets' of Bombay,' according to Lari.
The most monumental feature of the building is its clock tower, which is positioned right at the center of the front wing. It was designed in a very symmetrical manner, with the front and back being exactly the same.
It has two levels. The first level features an arched entrance at the very bottom and then there is a balcony above it. The balcony is adorned with beautiful wrought iron grills. The second level has the clock installed and above that, the canopy of the tower serves as the cover for the structure.
Each wing of the market was originally dedicated to a separate function, a different type of shopping, according to Soomro. In some areas, there were wet groceries, and in others, dry groceries.
While this zoning has blurred, the market remains a vibrant hub.
'It's a very historic and old market, and the best thing about it is that you can find everything in bulk — it's called a one-stop shop,' said Zia Shahid, a regular at Empress Market.
'From vegetables to dry fruits, from groceries to various other items, you can get everything here at very good rates.'
But it isn't just the wide variety of items that attract shoppers to the market. Many visit the place due to its magnificent structure and to take photos.
'We had heard a lot about how the art of photography stands out here in this market, in its own unique way,' said Afaan Adnan, a 21-year-old student, unaware of the site's bleak past.
'We needed to take some pictures in which we could tell stories. Empress Market is a key part of Karachi, where countless stories unfold. We are here to capture them.'
But for shopkeepers like Y.B. Sethna, Empress Market is deeply personal as his family has been here since 1938.
'In 1938, my grandfather came to the market... After 1946, there was Partition, so the person he was working with at the time left and he said to my grandfather, 'you've worked hard with us, so why don't you take over this shop?',' he said, adding that his grandfather, father and uncle used to run the grocery shop before him.
Sethna's long association with the market has kept him from moving elsewhere.
'When I was seven years old, they [Sethna's grandfather and other elders] would hold my hand and bring me here,' he said, adding people often ask him why he didn't open a shop at a less crowded place with relative calm.
'The attachment I had with this place was so strong that I couldn't leave it.'