The Bazaars of Old Delhi: A Chandni Chowk Walking Tour

Being in Old Delhi is one of the world’s great sensory experiences. This royal city from the 1600s has reinvented itself as a labyrinth of wholesale markets, ancient temples, and street food dynasties.

On this walking tour, you’ll trace the rise and fall of the Mughal Empire through the bazaars, backstreets, and buildings of Chandni Chowk, hearing stories about warrior queens, martyred saints, and the merchants who outlasted them all.

The tour starts at the Digambar Jain Lal Temple, built alongside the city in the mid-1600s, on a street that once hosted elephant processions and a moonlit water channel. You’ll wind through Dariba Kalan – a silver market that once supplied perfumes to the last Mughal emperor – and into Naughara, a heritage lane of nine merchant mansions with intricately carved doorways depicting hibiscus, elephants, and parrots.

You’ll make your way through Khari Baoli, one of Asia’s largest spice markets, into the Gadodia Market warehouse where sacks of pepper, cardamom, and asafoetida line every wall. I’ll point out the Haveli of Lala Chunnamal, the only mansion on Chandni Chowk still owned by its original family. The tour ends at Gurudwara Sis Ganj Sahib, the Sikh shrine marking the site where the ninth Sikh Guru was martyred in 1675.

On this 90-minute tour, you’ll also have a chance to:

• Learn how Princess Jahanara’s water tank gave the street its name
• Pass the mansion of Begum Samru, a dancing girl turned mercenary commander who ruled her own principality
• Visit Fatehpuri Mosque, commissioned by one of Shah Jahan’s wives in the late 1600s
• Admire the Shwetambara Jain Mandir, with frescoes painted in real gold and 18th-century English tiles
• Explore Paranthewali Gali, where three deep-frying paratha restaurants have been operating since the 1870s
• Discover how a mosque became the site of Nader Shah’s order to massacre Delhi in 1739
• Taste the legendary jalebis from Old Famous Jalebiwala, a 200-year-old shop with a closely guarded recipe

By the end of this tour, you’ll have experienced the chaos that encompasses Old Delhi and Chandni Chowk, and have a new appreciation for its rich history.