Khan Market, established in 1951, and named in honour of freedom fighter Khan Abdul Jabbar Khan, brother of Abdul Ghaffar Khan. It was ranked as the most expensive retail location in India in 2007. In 2019, it was rated as the world's 20th most expensive retail high street by real estate firm. Now it is world's 20th most expensive retail high street by the same firm. Cushman & Wakefield and is consistently ranked as one of the costliest high-end streets.
History
Established in 1951, the U-shaped, double-storey market complex originally had 154 shops and 74 flats on the first floor for shopkeepers. Many of these shops were allocated as seed land to immigrants from the North-West Frontier Province after the partition of India, Khan Market is named in honor of Khan Abdul Ghaffar Khan, a Pashtun political and spiritual leader whose memory is deeply respected throughout India. Nearby is Sujan Singh Park, New Delhi's first apartment complex, built in 1945, and designed by Walter Sykes George and named after the grandfather of this enclave's most famous resident, writer Khushwant Singh. George also designed, the Ambassador Hotel next door, built in 1945 in a mix of British and Art Deco style. The building is now a heritage property and the hotel has been taken over by the Taj Vivanta chain. Until the 1980s, all the flats on the first floor continued to serve as homes. Neighbourhood grocery stores and middle-class shops existed in the middle lane, despite the fact it catered most up to upmarket Golf Links, Sundar Nagar, and diplomatic crowd from Chanakyapuri. Gradually, the real estate boom and expanding families of the first generation of occupants forced many families to move out. Thus these homes were sold and started being converted into shops. By the 2010s, only a few families were living in these two-room flats. A 2011 Cushman & Wakefield survey ranked Khan Market as the world's 21st most expensive shopping street.
Overview
Today it has grown to become one of the most expensive commercial real estate locations in the city. However, by international standards the public realm is very run down and not at all high end. It has a wide variety of stores, including modern showrooms of most of well-known brands, silver jewellery stores, delicatessens, bookstores, paints and hardware stores, electronics, kitchenware, and fabric stores mingle with some of the better restaurants. It is also famous for food including kebabs and a retail market for lighting fixtures on the ground floor. There are several bookstores in the market. The market is closed on Sundays.
Location
Khan Market is almost in the heart of the city, close to India Gate. It is surrounded by residential complexes — government owned and private — including Golf Links, Lodhi Estate, Shahjahan Road, Pandara Road, Rabindra Nagar and Sujan Singh Park. Its environs are home to a significant number of bureaucrats from the central government, and famous people like the satirist Khushwant Singh. It is one of the greenest pockets of the city, very close to the famed Lodhi Gardens. Also in proximity are the India International Centre, the India Habitat Centre, offices of the World Wide Fund for Nature, and other organizations.
Transport
It is serviced by the Khan Market underground station of the Delhi Metro, which lies in front of the colonial-era Ambassador Hotel. There are four exits of the metro station namely Gate 1, Gate 2, Gate 3 and Gate 4. The exit at Gate 4 leads to Khan Market.
