Delhi (New Delhi), India - Delhi Travel Guide

Delhi, India

India Gate, New Delhi, India (cc)

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Part old city, part modern capital – at once an enigmatic and jumbled slice of civilization. Laze around in the tree-shaded greenbelts surrounding India Gate, pop into the stores or sip chai at the teahouses in the British-era Connaught Place, haggle at the handicraft emporiums along Janpath, be dazzled by the sound-and-light show at the ancient Red Fort, experience the human traffic in the back-alleys of Chandni Chowk, or simply kick back at a cinema house screening a Bollywood movie. It's all part of the trip.

Delhi Travel Guide

Introduction

Delhi, capital of India, is a study in contrasts. It is at once an old city and a modern capital, a city of chaos and order, a city of narrow, congested market streets and broad, tree-lined avenues, a city where Mughal- and British-era architecture are juxtaposed, a city where squalor and splendor coexist. Indeed, the two parts of Delhi, Old Delhi and New Delhi, remain centuries apart: the first populated with mosques, old forts and relics from India's Mughal past, among them such popular draws as the Red Fort, Jama Masjid and Chandni Chowk, together with enclaves where the human traffic alone can be daunting; and the latter a planned, modern city, laid out by Edwin Lutyens and Herbert Baker, with no dearth of British-Indian architecture, the likes of Rashtrapati Bhavan (Presidential Palace), India Gate and Connaught Place, and a profusion of contemporary markets, skyscrapers, five-star hotels, gymkhana clubs and rock-till-you-drop discothèques. There are temples, tombs, movie theaters, chaat vendors, stray cows, fountains and grassy patches throughout the city, together with the ubiquitous yellow-and-green scooter-rickshaws weaving in and out of traffic, accompanied by a cacophony of car horns and the din of the daily crush. Ultimately, it must be fair to say that Delhi isn't just another city, it's a happening, and a marvelous, albeit haphazardly jumbled, slice of civilization.

Location

Delhi is situated in north-central India, some 721 miles (1121 km) north of Mumbai, 809 miles (1302 km) west of Calcutta, and 556 miles (890 km) south of Srinagar.