What lies inside Delhi's diplomatic enclaves?

NEW DELHI: Have the tree lined avenues stretching from Lutyens Delhi to Chanakyapuri ever caught your fancy? While queueing up for visas at the embassies in Delhi, have you felt the urge to look beyond the exotic flags fluttering in the royal islands?

For the 'non-diplomatic' population of the country, the diplomatic avenues would be no less than palace like structures, which are unfortunately not on display for them or rest of the world which can reveal as to what lies inside.

Similar thoughts hovered in Gladys Abankwa-Meier-Klodt's mind and she decided to let the world know about how the embassies in Delhi look like, what is where and why?

Gladys, wife of a senior German diplomat and the daughter of Ghanaian career diplomats, has chronicled an insider's view of this rarefied world in her book "Delhi's Diplomatic Domains".

Offering, a glimpse beyond the gates of over 40 of New Delhi's purpose built and heritage property foreign missions, the book reveals history of their establishment, historical relationships with India, as well as the architecture, interiors and landscaping of these diplomatic domains.

"Having spent long part of my life among missions, I was always fascinated about these buildings. But the idea of documenting them for everyone to know about the intricate details, strike me when I was in London," Glady's told PTI in an interview.

But by the time, the idea caught my fantasy, it was too late to be doing that in London. When I came to Delhi in 2011, I was fascinated to see the diplomatic area and knew that this could be the best country for this book, she said.

"What made it even more interesting is the fact that in London, the embassies were adapted to be the diplomatic domains, while in India they were created to be so," said Gladys who was here at the Taj Mahal Hotel for an exhibition of archival material and artifacts from different embassies.