Kasauli: Between nostalgia and now

Kasauli is a small hill town in Shivalik hills, near Chandigarh. Far enough from the urban chaos, yet close enough to beckon weekend wanderers, Kasauli has long been a refuge for those seeking both solitude and stature. Its winding roads and whispering pines have enticed many politicians, writers, judges, industrialists and actors alike to build summer homes here, letting the quiet hills guard their private lives.

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But Kasauli is more than just a picturesque playground for the privileged. For some, it is home — a place not merely lived in, but lived through.

There was a time when my native town breathed a different rhythm. With a population so small it felt like an extended family, each face along the narrow paths was familiar. Greetings were expected not as formality, but as silent threads that held the fabric of the town together. Though back then, it seemed tiresome. Now, in cities where names dissolve into noise and eyes rarely meet, that small-town courtesy feels like a forgotten art. Kasauli taught without ever being a teacher. It held lessons in slowness, in intimacy and in the beauty of recognition and familiarity.

Now, the town appears changed. Once empty lanes now swell with hundreds of visitors. Where once the town slipped into slumber by 8 pm, it now buzzes into the early hours, a reflection of its new identity as a popular tourist magnet. The faces are new. The pace, unfamiliar.

There is a quiet melancholy in witnessing this metamorphosis. The Kasauli that once was — a slower, gentler place — may be fading, yet the new town offers another kind of solace. For many, it now serves as a much-needed reprieve from the relentless demands of modern life.

Perhaps the charm that once defined the town still lives on not perhaps in its unchanged landscapes, but in the memories it anchors and the moments it continues to offer. It is not easy to decide whether the real Kasauli was the one etched in childhood familiarity, or this new incarnation that opens its arms to weary hearts seeking temporary escape.

Navya Singh, Chandigarh