Lutyens prepared a plan of the layout of the new city and where he meant to locate the Viceregal palace and the Secretariats. I heard that in his original plan Lutyens had wanted to dam the Jamna behind Humayun’s tomb and make a huge ornamental lake extending from the Red Fort to Purana Qila with a lakeside drive and waterways running through the city. This was not approved because of the enormous cost. Lutyens also wanted to drive a road from the Viceregal palace to the Jamia Masjid piercing the old Mughal city wall and the bazaars. This was also turned down. The rest was approved by the Viceroy as well as King George whom Lutyens met on his return to England. Lutyens got an old colleague, Herbert Baker, to share the work with him. In addition to the general layout of the city, Lutyens assigned to himself the Viceregal palace and the War Memorial Arch; Baker designed the Secretariats and the Parliament. The rest of the work was equally divided between them. They had known each other for many years. Baker had chosen Lutyens to be his co-architect for buildings in South Africa. Lutyens was returning the compliment by choosing Baker as his partner in the building of New Delhi. Everyone thought they were good friends. But envy of Lutyens’s genius and popularity with royalty and the Vicereine soured Baker’s mind.

Lutyens was a man of vision. Although neither he nor Baker had too great an opinion of our old palaces, mosques and temples, they agreed to give an Indian touch to their designs. What impressed me most about Lutyens was that even before roads were laid, he ordered trees to be planted along the proposed routes. A huge nursery was set up to raise the right kind of saplings. Lutyens wanted slow-growing but massive, long-living trees like banyans, neems and tamarinds. The official horticulturist imported some exotic trees like the Sausage and the African Tulip tree from East Africa. Lutyens talked of designing a city which would meet the needs of its citizens for two hundred years and forecast that one day the English would leave India and let Indians manage their own affairs. I am not sure whether he was like some crazy Englishmen who sided with Indian nationalists, but his wife was known to do so. It was rumoured that she had run away to Madras and was having an affair with a Hindu boy who had been proclaimed a messiah. All I can say is that though I saw Lutyens many times in his office and bungalow I never saw his wife. Also, the English didn’t like talking about Mrs Lutyens.

Our first summer in Delhi made us decide that we would make our home there. It was less hot than our desert village and the rainy season was very pleasant. Above all, we were making more money than we had dreamed of. By the autumn we had added more rooms to our home, hired a gardener and a couple of servants. My mother, wife and sons joined us. So did many other families from our village whom we employed as clerks, labour managers and storekeepers. Thereafter we only went back to the village to attend the marriages of relations or the funerals of people we knew.