New Delhi: In the mid-seventeenth century, when the Mughal emperor Shah Jahan moved his capital from Agra to the banks of the Yamuna, he envisioned a city both secure enough to defend an empire and grand enough to display its grandeur. Thus, Shahjahanabad, known as the seventh historical city of Delhi, was born within a 13 meter high, six kilometer long formidable wall of stone and rubble. The fortifications were punctuated with 13 monumental gateways and 14 small wicket gates, sealing the boundary of the city often described by historians as “civilization and wilderness”, between order and the chaotic world outside.
Originally made of mud, the wall was rebuilt in red sandstone in 1657. But centuries later, what remains is scattered, stressed and wounded. Its decline began with the British conquest, and continues due to civic neglect, uncontrolled construction, and layers of everyday urban life buried in its stones.
Today, the last part of the fortifications still standing, the Daryaganj section – often described as the best preserved – stands in peril. During a spot check on a 1.4-km stretch, HT found that some parts were crumbling, debris was spreading over parked scooters, and some parts had been swallowed up due to careless urban development. Temporary temples nestle within its arches. Electrical transformers are leaning on the stone. Hospital visitors sit in waiting areas carved out of ancient cracks in the wall.
Near a printing unit, Rajeev Dubey, a worker, points to a jagged hole in the structure where a large chunk had fallen during the monsoon. “Thank God no one was standing there. Only the vehicles have been damaged. But the next part can collapse any time. It needs to be strengthened,” he said.
This was three months ago, but the debris has not been picked up yet.
Along Ansari Road, the Mughal arches are barely visible behind a pile of construction debris, old bicycles, metal shelves and discarded furniture. Some of the arches are used as parking bays or seating areas for patients of the nearby hospital. Others have been converted into informal gaming dens where men play cards. A police post, a milk booth and a small temple cling to the structure like parasitic fixtures along with heaps of garbage, urinals and other encroachments.
All this happened despite the wall being a protected monument under the Archaeological Survey of India (ASI). Its boards warn of fines and prison terms for violators. However, enforcement has been irregular at best. A senior municipal corporation official said that although several drives to remove encroachments have been carried out, “the problem reoccurs again and again” and violations occur almost instantaneously.
Demolition of the walls of Shahjahanabad began soon after the Revolt of 1857, when British forces, fearing that the city might once again become a hotbed of rebellion, sought to ensure that it could never serve as a military stronghold against the Crown. At the Kashmiri Gate, traces of the siege remain – cannonball marks on the wall, a memorial plaque and ruined fragments of what was once the city’s northern gate. Here, in 1857, parts of the gate were blown up by British troops during the suppression of the rebellion.
Many other gates disappeared more discreetly. Mori Gate, once located near Nicholson and Hamilton Road, survives today, but in name only – the bus terminal and road still bear its name.
The Kabuli Gate, which was demolished in 1873 to make way for new infrastructure, has completely disappeared and has been absorbed into wholesale markets. What remained of its foundations was eventually swallowed up by 20th century construction.
Historian Narayani Gupta traces the post-1857 transformation of the Wall in her book Delhi Between Two Empires (1803–1931). In February 1858, a few months after recapturing the city, British military authorities ordered that the walls of Delhi be demolished, considering them a security threat. But administrators such as Sir John Lawrence opposed this decision and argued about the heavy labor and gunpowder required to demolish it. In practice, soldiers and laborers probably began removing the stones manually – slowly – as a way of stopping.
By the end of 1858, the British reversed their stance and decided to retain large sections of the wall as well as the surrounding ditch and a wide open area for observation. The function of the wall changed for the first time: it was no longer a defensive structure for the Mughal city, it became an administrative boundary. The poet Mirza Ghalib said in 1858 that structures outside the wall were ordered to be demolished to keep the area clean and open for military movement.
In the decades that followed, the pressure to modernize Delhi led to frequent conflicts over the existence of the wall. The cramped inner city required new roads, and the expanding settlements outside the walls required proper access to the city. In 1881, the British urban planner Robert Clarke advocated demolishing the Lahori Gate and parts of the wall to improve connectivity between Sadar Bazar and Shahjahanabad. Military officials argued for preserving sections such as the Kashmiri Gate for historical reasons, but the municipal committee ultimately approved the demolition.
In 1888, the committee approved the proposal to demolish the wall near Lahori Gate and Khari Baoli. The justification is recorded in a communication preserved in the Delhi Archives: “The entire grain traffic of Delhi… is concentrated just inside the Lahore Gate… The Kabul (Kabul) and Mori Gates have long been removed… The Lahore Gate, now proposed to be demolished, has no historical interest in connection with the rebellion and no architectural pretensions.” The wall and gate were demolished “on sanitary grounds” and for “cessation of traffic”.
These decisions set in motion the gradual, almost inevitable dismantling of the fortifications – which was accelerated when colonial officials such as HC Beadon oversaw expansion plans between 1912 and 1919. This included demolishing sections of the Kabul to Ajmeri Gates and filling the moat that once surrounded the city. New roads – Burnt Bastion Road, Jhandewalan Road – were built to transform Delhi into the British capital. This change proved to be a turning point: the city’s growth was no longer organic, but guided by state planning, erasing the centuries-old layers of the Mughal city.
Author and city historian Sohail Hashmi said that many sections of the wall and gates were removed due to the expansion of the city and changes that occurred after the arrival of the railway in the 1860s. “The Muslim residents who had any connection with the fort were also being harassed after 1857. They were asked to move out and the government would give certificates regarding the size of the properties so that they could get corresponding properties elsewhere. I do not think the wall was broken for security purposes. The British had nothing to fear after 1857 and the capital was also in Calcutta.”
Hashmi said that before 1857, the British had actually strengthened the walls and gates. “After the Battle of Patparganj in 1803, when the British subdued the Marathas, they were worried that the Marathas would again take the field and attack which led to the strengthening of the city’s defences. The Turkman Gate, the Delhi Gate and the Kashmiri Gate and the wall section apparently have some additions which were added to allow the cannons and their movement.”
Even after independence the wall kept disappearing. In the 1950s, Delight Cinema in today’s Daryaganj was built on a plot of land that was once part of the wall. Its founder, Brij Mohan Lal Raizada, built it in response to Jawaharlal Nehru’s call for new venues in Delhi – and it was only after clearing a section of the old wall that the cinema stood at the pinnacle of Old and New Delhi.
“After Independence, Nehru also wanted the two cities (Old and New Delhi) to be separated when projects like Delight Cinema and buildings on Asaf Ali Road came up and the wall was removed,” Hashmi said.
a wall under siege
During spot checking of HT, the gradual opening of the wall was completely visible. Lithophyte trees – plants that hide themselves in crevices of stone – have taken root deeply inside the ramparts. Their roots break apart the stones and accelerate decay. Near Martello Tower – one of several British-era observation posts built after the Rebellion of 1857 – a large garbage dump stretches against the base of the wall. In another location, the wall serves as the back wall of the house, its surface plastered and hidden under paint.
Construction has also increased the load on the ancient stonework. Sewage water seeps through many joints, making it even weaker. In August, three laborers were killed when a wall of a building collapsed in Daryaganj. A large hole left by that collapse is now covered with sheets of green tin – yet there is no sign of any repairs. To the north, sections of the wall near the Outer Ring Road have been completely destroyed – cleared for roads, drains, or simply demolished for reasons not remembered today by authorities or locals.
Near Nigambodh Ghat, another section broke recently. A relatively intact section remains between Nicholson Road and Kashmere Gate, but this too is marked by encroachment, garbage dumping and piecemeal stone removal. Behind the ISBT, the remains of the wall are intermittently visible, disrupted by road widening and development over the decades. Despite being a designated heritage structure, much of the wall exists today outside of continued conservation – protected in theory, but abandoned in practice.
Gates such as Mori, Kabuli and Lahori now survive mainly in name, while Ajmeri, Turkman and Delhi gates are relatively well preserved. Yet, the invisible line of the vanished wall continues to define notions of “Old Delhi” and its cultural geography.
more than a stone
Historian M Mujib, in his biography of Mirza Ghalib, writes that the city wall once stood “as a bulwark of culture against the surrounding barbarism”, marking Shahjahanabad’s oasis against savagery. He said, this wall is not just a relic of Mughal engineering, it is the history of Delhi’s development, its resistance and its evolution into modernity.
Narayani Gupta states that the Wall “created a sense of community that transcended communal and class groupings. The structure of the perimeter was as sentimental as it was of stone and mortar. Time and again, from Bernier to Abdul Hai, observers have remarked how the people of Delhi were indifferent to anything beyond their walls. With it came a deep love for the city.”
Hashmi said the perimeter still defines the life and identity of Shahjahanabad. “The area within the 13 gates was and still is Old Delhi. Even when families who have lived for generations in areas like Mehrauli refer to the ‘city’, they mean the area that was walled.”
But what remains today barely qualifies as a wall – it is a fragmentary marker, cracked over time, destroyed by centuries of neglect. Yet hidden within these fragments is the story of Delhi itself: its rise as an imperial capital, its violent occupation, its reinvention as a colonial city, and its transformation into a modern metropolis. A wall that once protected the world now needs protection from the world growing up around it.
An Archaeological Survey of India official said they will check whether the said portion falls under their jurisdiction and assess the damage accordingly.
