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Photo Essay – Connaught Place in Mid-Life Makeover

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Photo Essay – Connaught Place in Mid-Life Renovation

Capturing the re-rise of a Delhi landmark.

[Text and pictures by Mayank Austen Soofi]

On October 15th, 1764, Edward Gibbon sat amidst the ruins in Rome, the sight evoked grandeur, he wrote a six-volume classic. In the light of such an historic incident, it is Delhi’s loss that Mr Gibbon did not live long to witness the ruins of the dilapidated inner circle of Connaught Place (CP). He could have written another masterpiece.

However, one rainy September morning in 2009, The Delhi Walla took a walk there. In the middle of a major renovation, undertaken by New Delhi Municipal Council (NDMC), this British-built corridor is trying to revive itself into its former grandeur. The walk offered a rare sight. The famous white pillars had been stripped off their colour, the floor was dug, the roof was tainted red with exposed bricks, and the shoppers were replaced by construction labourers, their children, and their dogs. It was the closest you could have come to those scenes when New Delhi was being built in the 1930s.

Enjoy the pictures. Who knows you might be the next Gibbon.

Waiting for the new look

Photo Essay – Connaught Place in Mid-Life Renovation

It’s getting a new skin

Photo Essay – Connaught Place in Mid-Life Renovation

CP’s temporary residents (The children of construction labourers)

Photo Essay – Connaught Place in Mid-Life Renovation

Ms Ram Pyari, a labourer from Mahoba, Central India

Photo Essay – Connaught Place in Mid-Life Renovation

Looking lost

Photo Essay – Connaught Place in Mid-Life Renovation

The white has gone, must return

Photo Essay – Connaught Place in Mid-Life Renovation

CP ruins

Photo Essay – Connaught Place in Mid-Life Renovation

The roof’s getting done

Photo Essay – Connaught Place in Mid-Life Renovation

Someone must go up

Photo Essay – Connaught Place in Mid-Life Renovation

Don’t look up for now

Photo Essay – Connaught Place in Mid-Life Renovation

Rainy day

Photo Essay – Connaught Place in Mid-Life Renovation

This portion done!

Photo Essay – Connaught Place in Mid-Life Renovation

Man at work

Photo Essay – Connaught Place in Mid-Life Renovation

CP dreams

Photo Essay – Connaught Place in Mid-Life Renovation

6 thoughts on “Photo Essay – Connaught Place in Mid-Life Makeover

  1. Love CP – hate what it’s become. I’ve seen the work being performed. Why do construction sites in India look so medieval?.
    There’s no order to the work, and it’s filthy, with worksites exposed to the rain. The real CP is gone. There’s no system to even the signboards above the shops. Everything seems hodge-podge. How long before those same columns are plastered with posters and the ground stained with paan, competing for space amid all the hawkers allowed to ply their trades in front of the shops, blocking circulation?. This is not a spruce-up job for the NDMC, but an urban design study needs to be undertaken to bring it back to its original glory, keeping modern needs (like parking) in mind.

  2. wooooooooooowwwwwwwwwww
    ab acha hi hoga thn
    nice pics
    are yaar wo evening ki iftaar ki pics to dikhao from jama masjid

  3. sawaad- e roma tul kubra main dilli yaad aati hai, wahi ibrat wahi azmat wahi shaan e dil-aawayzi…..

  4. love it or hate it.. delhi’s dil is undoubtedly c.p n the best place to hang around.. from needles to swords to books to clothes.. u name it n c.p has got it.. besides its beautiful… nic wrk…wud lik to see the not so demolished sights too..:)

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