The Indira Gandhi Memorial Museum is housed in her former home, a long low white bungalow.  (Bungalow another gift to the English language from the Raj) 

Inside you will see  her living room and study, family photos, her writings and the  blood stained sari she was wearing  when she was, assassinated.  As well as the clothes her son Rajiv wore in 1991 when he met a similar fate .

Leaving her bungalow I passed the garden where Mrs. Gandhi collapsed following an attack by two of her Sikh bodyguards on Diwali 1984.  The pathway is paved with crystal.  The plain glass tile with the rose marks the spot where she succumbed to her injuries.

Barely visible behind these magnificent Lutyens gates lies Rashtrapati Bhavan the largest residence of any Head of State.

Formerly the British Viceregal Lodge it is fittingly now occupied by the President of the largest democracy in the world.  It took 17 years to build and only 18 years later India no longer needed a Viceroy.

Immediately in front is the Jaipur Column a gift from the Maharaja of Jaipur.  It stands 145' high at its top is a bronze lotus raising a six pointed crystal star and around its base an inscription composed by the then Viceroy Lord Irwin and the architect of New Delhi, Edwin Landseer Lutyens:

In thought faith, In word wisdom, In deed courage, In life service, So may India be great.

India Gate

A 42 meter memorial at the eastern end of Rajpath.  On it are inscribed the names of the 90.000 Indian soldiers who fell fighting for the British in WW1.

Here it is dwarfed by the Lutyens Canopy which once housed an enormous statue of George V Emperor of India which is now consigned to a graveyard of imperial statuary in north Delhi.  In fact the only statue of a westerner still in it's original position in New Delhi is the bust of E L Lutyens in the former Viceregal Lodge.

The vast canopy now stands empty amid a continuing debate regarding it's demolition.  

Whilst the Delhi Gate was surrounded by many Indian visitors, I was the only person  musing on the impermanence of Empire at the canopy.