Kashmiri Mal Ki Haveli

Tucked into the tangled lanes of Siddheshwar (Garhwasi Tola) in the Chowk quarter, a short walk above Sankatha Ghat, the Kashmiri Mal Ki Haveli is one of the four mansions that old-timers count among the architectural glories of Banaras.

• It was raised around 1870 by Kashmiri Mal, a hundi (bill-of-exchange) banker of the Todarmal lineage who financed traders and, by local account, even lent to the British.
• He commissioned a home built almost entirely of the warm red sandstone quarried at Chunar — a feat of logistics in an era when each block had to be ferried and hauled up from the river through streets barely wide enough for two people.
• The result sprawled across more than twelve biswas and once held upwards of twenty-five rooms, ranged around courtyards, carved brackets, jharokha windows and deep verandahs in the classic Kashi haveli idiom.
• Time and the river-damp climate have been unkind.
• Two of the upper floors have collapsed, leaving a single storey standing, and the property remains privately held rather than a conserved public monument.
• Yet even in ruin the craftsmanship is legible: the fine-grained Chunar stone, the proportion of the surviving arcades, the ghostly outline of what was clearly a grand mercantile household.
• TasteYatra presents this haveli honestly, as a heritage-conservation site and a photographer's study in patina, not as a ticketed attraction — there is no formal entry, and the interiors are not open to visitors.
• Admire the facade respectfully from the public lane, and please do not enter or climb the fragile structure.
• The haveli sits amid a constellation of old-city landmarks.
• It is a lane or two from the Sankatha Devi Temple and Sankatha Ghat, close to Scindia Ghat and the wider Chowk bazaar, so it slots naturally into a slow morning of heritage walking through the Siddha Kshetra maze.
• Pair it with the wooden Kath Ki Haveli near Kaal Bhairav and the half-built Adhi Haveli at Chaukhamba to trace the whole story of Banaras's merchant-prince architecture.
• For the vegetarian traveller, this pocket of the old city is a feast.
• You are within a few minutes' walk of some of Kashi's most storied pure-vegetarian counters: Ram Bhandar in Thatheri Bazar (serving Banarasi kachori-sabzi and jalebi since 1887), Rajbandhu in Kachori Gali, and the legendary Kashi Chat Bhandar down in Godowlia for tamatar chaat and palak patta chaat. All are strictly vegetarian.
• One friendly caution unique to Varanasi — many thandai and lassi stalls in these lanes serve bhang (cannabis); if you want a cooling drink, ask clearly for a plain lassi or plain thandai without bhang, and stick to the pure-veg sweet houses named here.