Place · Parliament building · India
Parliament House / Sansad Bhavan
The 1927 Sansad Bhavan (Parliament House) in New Delhi, designed by Herbert Baker and Edwin Lutyens as the Central Legislative Assembly building under British rule — the circular 173-metre-diameter structure with 144 columns inspired by the 10th-century Chausath Yogini Temple at Mitaoli, Madhya Pradesh. The building housed the Imperial Legislative Council (1927-47), the Constituent Assembly (1946-50 that drafted the Indian Constitution), and the Parliament of India from 1950. The 2023 inauguration of the new triangular Sansad Bhavan designed by Bimal Patel on an adjacent site shifted parliamentary function; the 1927 Baker-Lutyens building is now preserved as a museum. The December 2001 Parliament attack by Jaish-e-Mohammed killed nine. UNESCO tentative list (as part of New Delhi).
- Function
- Religious institution & practice
- Confidence
- Established / referenced
- Location
- 28.617, 77.209
Connections (5)
- Architectural modelChausath Yogini, Mitaoli
The Chausath Yogini temple at Mitaoli and India’s old Parliament House are often compared because both have circular architectural forms. Mitaoli’s 11th-century temple has a circular plan with a central shrine and surrounding chambers. Designed by Edwin Lutyens and Herbert Baker, Parliament House likewise adopted a circular form, though there is no established architectural evidence of direct inspiration from Mitaoli.
- Contemporary capital withRashtrapati Bhavan
Baker's Council House and Lutyens's Viceroy's House were built simultaneously for two incompatible ideas of what British India was becoming: a consultative legislature with elected Indian members, and a viceregal court with three hundred and forty rooms. The first became the Parliament of a republic and the second its President's residence, both without structural alteration.
- AnalogueSārnāth
The lion capital from the Ashokan pillar at Sarnath was adopted as the state emblem of India in January 1950 and its wheel is at the centre of the flag. The name Sarnath is itself contracted from Sarangnatha, lord of the deer, a Shaiva epithet attached to the deer park, so the Republic's emblem comes from a Buddhist pillar at a site named for Shiva.
- Site withinDelhi
Parliament House / Sansad Bhavan lies within Delhi — the two sites sit about 0 km apart, well inside the city's historical boundary and part of the same urban or peri-urban landscape. Parliament House / Sansad Bhavan is one of the specific sites that give Delhi its layered character, and reads differently when seen as a stop within the larger city rather than as an isolated monument on an open map. The surrounding neighbourhoods, roads and other heritage ensembles belong to the same single urban fabric.
- Site withinConstitution Hall (Parliament House)
The Constitution Hall (Central Hall of Parliament House) sits within the 1927 Sansad Bhavan Parliament House in central New Delhi. The Central Hall was the venue of the Constituent Assembly's December 1946-January 1950 debates that drafted the Indian Constitution, and the room from which Nehru delivered the 'Tryst with Destiny' address on 15 August 1947. The hall remains the room where joint sessions of both Houses of Parliament are held.
On these journeys
Sources
Wikipedia, “Parliament House”. Archaeological Survey of India and State Archaeology monument records, and the standard regional literature.
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