Delhi's modern architectural heritage

The unforgettable triangular patterns that impressed upon the memories of visitors to the trade fairs at Pragati Maidan over many decades now lie strewn about, reduced to a rubble. The Hall of Nations & The Hall of Industry is no more. Despite protests from conservationists, Raj Rewal’s iconic structures built in 1972 had to make way for a series of new complexes. Hall of Nations was among the 62 buildings constructed after Independence in Delhi that INTACH had listed as Modern Architectural Heritage of India, for ‘a period of architectural history when India was forging a modern identity’. They were a marker of the desires of a newly independent nation, of a way of thinking that attempted to overcome a feudal and colonial past, and visualised a secular way forward, while affirming obliquely the roots and values of an ancient civilisation.

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