As our flight landed in Chandigarh, we had half a day in hand to roam around.

So we decided to get a teeny weeny experience of smoke free city of India.

History behind the city
Little glimpse of history behind the city is necessary to start with. At the time of Indo-Pak partition in 1947, when Pakistan was stamped out of western Punjab, the then capital of Punjab, Lahore, went to the other side.

As Punjab in India was left without a capital of its own, Pandit Jawaharlal Nehru took personal interest in carving out a brand new capital city for Punjab. And that is how Chandigarh came into existence.

Chandigarh
The manifestation of a dream that Chachaji Nehru envisaged and Le Corbusier accomplished.

Admiring the beauty of the city, we headed directly to rock garden.Chandigarh is basically divided into sectors which are well connected to each other, with each sector having a park, shopping complex of its own. With trees on both sides of road, the city is maintained like a newly built Township. Certainly, I have never seen a well planned city like Chandigarh.

Rock Garden
When you missed your hometown so much and there seemed no way of going back, you would probably come with a creative idea like this. Hats off to the one man who was behind the construction of Rock Garden. A construction as a result of Indo- Pak partition – 1947.

Rock garden by Nek Chand was basically a reflection of his village in Pakistan. He created it by recycling the scrap materials like broken chinaware, glass bangles, building waste collected from various demolition sites. Having an eye for art, it was indeed a treat. From Rock garden, we went to Sukhna Lake.

Sukhna Lake
This man made lake lies with the backdrop of majestic Shivalik range and is a desired picnic location right in the middle of the city(Walkable distance from Rock garden). While walking along the curvilinear profile of the lake, you would come across various artists sketching portraits of people. We spent our evening simply lazing around in the lake.

From the two Punjabi old men whom we happened to have a few minute conversation in Sukhna Lake to the aunty who reached out to help us in finding the address of YHAI, Chandigarh, everyone was so kind.

Punjabis
Punjab is a place where you can easily interact with locals, where conversation flows so easily even when I am struggling with language. And most importantly, my respect for Punjabis increased multi-fold after this visit to Chandigarh.

Punjabis love for food
As I had only half a day in hand, I couldn’t explore much on this part. But sure some day, I will be going on a food trip to Punjab.