Chandni Chowk’s Annapurna Bhandar, where Indira Gandhi ordered sweets after India’s 1983 WC win, to shut after nearly 100 years

One of Chandni Chowk’s oldest and most loved sweet shops, Annapurna Bhandar, will shut down on December 31, ending a nearly 100-year journey. The closure comes after a three-year legal battle over the property, not because of falling demand. For customers and workers alike, the decision marks the end of a daily ritual and a deep emotional bond tied to Old Delhi’s food culture.

“Don't say that. This is a legacy,” a shaken customer said, struggling to imagine Chandni Chowk without the shop that has been serving sweets since 1929. Sentiment, however, has not been enough to keep the shutters open.

A quiet goodbye after decades of celebrations

As the world prepares to welcome the New Year, Annapurna Bhandar is preparing for a quiet farewell. For generations, the shop near Gurudwara Sis Ganj Sahib was a fixed stop for families buying sweets for festivals, birthdays and milestones. Its counters, heavy with syrup-soaked sweets and ghee-rich snacks, became part of Old Delhi’s everyday life.


For many, visiting the shop was not just about food but about memory and habit.

Legal dispute, not lack of customers

The shop’s closure is the result of a long-running dispute between the Mukherjee family, which ran the business for decades, and the property owner. Mihir Mukherjee, 81, who managed the shop since 1965, said the landlord issued a legal notice to reclaim the premises for personal use.

“The matter went to court, and the verdict came against us, so we have to vacate the premises,” he said.

According to the family, the owner also demanded a monthly rent of nearly Rs 1.5 lakh, which they said was not financially viable for the business.

From a railway job to a Chandni Chowk landmark

Annapurna Bhandar was founded in 1929 by Mohinimohan Mukherjee, a former railways employee and Mihir Mukherjee’s grandfather. After the British shifted the capital from Calcutta to Delhi in 1911, he noticed a growing Bengali population in the city and saw an opportunity to serve traditional Bengali sweets.

Over time, the shop’s reputation spread far beyond Chandni Chowk.

From PMs to World Cup celebrations

The sweet shop counted some of India’s most powerful leaders among its customers. Former Prime Ministers Jawaharlal Nehru, Indira Gandhi and Rajiv Gandhi all visited the shop. After India won the Cricket World Cup in 1983, then Prime Minister Indira Gandhi ordered an assortment of its sweets, including sandesh and pink rasgulla, to welcome the team.

Despite its fame, the business remained family-run and modest in scale.

A family business with no successor

Annapurna Bhandar was managed by the older members of the Mukherjee family. “The younger generation works in corporate jobs. They earn much more than this, but for us, this shop was our main source of livelihood,” Mukherjee said.

The closure, therefore, is not just about losing a storefront but about the end of a way of life for those who depended on it.

The impact is also heavy on the shop’s workers, many of whom spent decades here. Bhopal Singh joined Annapurna Bhandar in 1989 and learnt the trade on the job.

“When I joined, I knew nothing about this business. In so many decades, I learnt everything here,” he said.

With the shop closing, Singh says he may have to return to his village in Uttarakhand if he cannot find work in Delhi. For workers like him, the shutdown is not just about a business ending, but about livelihoods, routines and relationships built over a lifetime.

As Annapurna Bhandar prepares to close its doors for the last time, Chandni Chowk is set to lose not just a sweet shop, but a piece of its living history.

(This article was originally published in TOI)