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Old Parliament House, New Delhi

former seat of the Parliament of India

Layered newspapers, civic records and oral-history reels arranged as chronological evidence
History and societyInterpretive dossier study · Crown Archives visual atlas
Record originEnglish Wikipedia
Text licenseCC BY-SA 4.0
Source revisionSep 13, 2026
Entity authorityQ15275136 ↗
Source-derived summary

The Old Parliament House, officially known as the Samvidhan Sadan (Constitution House) and formerly known as the Council House, was the seat of the Parliament of India between 26 January 1950 and 18 September 2023. It housed the Lok Sabha and the Rajya Sabha (the lower and upper houses) respectively in India's bicameral parliament for nearly 73 years. Earlier it had served as the seat of the Imperial Legislative Council between 18 January 1927 and 15 August 1947, and the Constituent Assembly of India between 15 August 1947 and 26 January 1950.

The building was designed by British architects Edwin Lutyens and Herbert Baker and was constructed between 1921 and 1927. It was opened in January 1927 as the seat of the Imperial Legislative Council. Following the Indian Independence in 1947, it was taken over by the Constituent Assembly of India, and then became the seat of the Indian Parliament on 26 January 1950 with India becoming a republic following the adoption of the Indian Constitution.

A New Parliament House, built adjacent to this building was inaugurated on 28 May 2023, and replaced the old Parliament building.

Early history

Background

During the coronation of George V as the Emperor of India on 12 December 1911, he announced the transfer of the seat of the colonial government from Calcutta to Delhi. In 1919, the Montagu–Chelmsford Reforms transformed the Imperial Legislative Council into a bicameral structure with two houses, those being the Central Legislative Assembly and Council of State. The reforms necessitated the construction of the building to accommodate the houses.

Editorial summary

“Old Parliament House, New Delhi” enters the record as former seat of the Parliament of India. Crown Archives preserves that source wording while asking what Parliament, House and Delhi can confirm, complicate or overturn.

Editorial reviewA strong contextual entry point for chronology, institutions and public events when official records are distinguished from later interpretation. The current lead gives the account dated anchors—1950, 2023, 1927, 1947—that can be checked directly. The linked authority record independently contributes the date 1927. Its strongest next move is a source search built around Parliament, House and Delhi.
Editorial analysis

Why this record matters

“Old Parliament House, New Delhi” is worth following because a concise public description often conceals a longer documentary argument. Here, Parliament, House and Delhi provides the most credible route into that argument.

Evidence profile

Chronology, provenance and viewpoint should be read together before a broad social or political interpretation is accepted. The source revision retrieved here is dated Sep 13, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q15275136. Authority coordinates are 28.617, 77.208. 1 of 3 selected statements include explicit references; 0 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 1950, 2023, 1927 and 1947.

Critical limits

Institutional narratives can privilege the records that survived while minimizing voices that were never formally collected. The source lead contains qualifying language; that uncertainty should survive quotation, summary and reuse. Authority statements aid reconciliation but still require their own references, qualifiers and ranks to be checked.

How to read it

Compare institutional narratives with records created by participants and affected communities. Dates and formal titles are useful anchors, but not substitutes for context.

Best used for
  • Event chronology
  • Institutional context
  • Locating named record creators
Verify next

Contemporary correspondence, government or organizational records, oral histories and cited historical scholarship.

Three-step research path

  1. Establish the record: confirm the title “Old Parliament House, New Delhi”, its source revision and the description used here.
  2. Expand the search: follow Old Parliament House, New Delhi primary sources, Old Parliament House, New Delhi archive and Parliament research across catalogues and specialist indexes.
  3. Test the account: compare the strongest cited source with the responsible institution’s current record and note any disagreement.

Questions for further research

  1. Which source most directly establishes the central claim about “Old Parliament House, New Delhi”?
  2. Who created the surviving record, and for what administrative purpose?
  3. What chronology connects this entry to wider political or social change?
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Source & attribution

This entry incorporates text from “Old Parliament House, New Delhi” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.