History
New Delhi was laid out to the south of the Old City which was constructed by Mughal Emperor Shah Jahan. However, New Delhi overlays the site of seven ancient cities and hence includes many historic monuments like the Jantar Mantar and the Lodhi Gardens.
Much of New Delhi was planned by Edwin Lutyens and Herbert Baker, the former of whom was a leading 20th century British architect, and contracted to Sir Sobha Singh. Lutyens first visited Delhi in 1912, and construction really began after World War I and was completed by 1931, when the city later dubbed "Lutyens' Delhi" was inaugurated. Lutyens laid out the central administrative area of the city as a testament to Britain's imperial aspirations.
Though soon Lutyens started considering other places, and finalized on a site atop the Raisina Hill, formerly Raisina Pind a Sikh village, for the Rashtrapati Bhawan, then known as the Viceroy's House. The historic reason being that the hill lay directly opposite to the Dinapanah citadel, which was also considered the site of Indraprastha, the oldest Delhi. Subsequently, the foundation stone was shifted from the site of Delhi Durbar of 1911-1912, where the Coronation Pillar stood as well, and embedded in the walls of the forecourt of the Secretariat. The Rajpath, also known as King's Way, stretched from the India Gate to the Rashtrapati Bhawan. The Secretariat building which houses various ministries of the Government of India, flanked out of the Rashtrapati Bhawan, and the Parliament House, both designed by Herbert Baker, is located at the Sansad Marg, which runs parallel to the Rajpath .
Calcutta was the capital of India until December 1911 during the British Raj. However, Delhi had served as the political and financial centre of several empires of ancient and medieval India, most notably of the Mughal Empire from 1799 to 1849. During the early 1900s, a proposal was made to the British administration to shift the capital of the Indian Empire from Calcutta to Delhi. Unlike Calcutta, which was located on the eastern coast of India, Delhi was located in northern India and the Government of British India felt that it would be easier to administer India from Delhi rather than from Calcutta. On December 12, 1911, George V, the then Emperor of India along with Queen Mary, during the Delhi Durbar, made the announcement that the capital of the Raj was to be shifted from Calcutta to Delhi, while laying the foundation stone for Viceroy's residence in the Coronation .
After India gained independence in 1947, a limited autonomy was conferred to New Delhi and was administered by a Chief Commissioner appointed by the Government of India. In 1956, Delhi was converted into a union territory and eventually the Chief Commissioner was replaced by a Lieutenant Governor. The Constitution (Sixty-ninth Amendment) Act, 1991 declared the Union Territory of Delhi to be formally known as National Capital Territory of Delhi. A system of diarchy was introduced under which the elected Government was given wide powers, excluding law and order which remained with the Central Government. The actual enforcement of the legislation came in 1993.
