About Us

Schools especially those of girls, usually have an interesting history. If you go via Chawri Bazar Chowk to Naiwara in Old Delhi, you will be pleasantly surprised to come across a school established in a haveli in 1924. Suraj Kanya Shikshalaya the primary section of Indraprastha Girls School, which itself is housed in the Haveli gifted by Lala Jagan Nath in 1904. The girls, who come from all over the city, enjoy studying in this institution occupying Patni Mal ki Haveli. Not much is known of Patni Mal but he seems to have been a rich merchant and a prominent personage among the Lalas of 19th Century Delhi who faced the onslaught of the British during the 1857 mutiny. The courtyard, where once purdah women were busy with their chores and featured celebrations, is now the assembly point for the students, who start the day with prayers and the singing of bhajans before reading the huge notice board and entering their classes. These are actually large residential rooms with pillars and ornamental arches, which have been partitioned for the lower and higher sections. The older girls have to go upstairs to their renovated classrooms, with a mesh protecting them from marauding monkeys. The girls have their own band too. The topmost part of the building is adorned with a Rajasthani style jharoka, from where you can look both into the school and the lane in which it is situated and where parents queue up in the afternoon to take their children back home. “We are very conscious of the security aspect in these times, when girls are targeted by anti social elements, says the management Meanwhile, the deep medieval well in one of the classrooms has been finally closed as tap and fridge water is now supplied to the students. The hand pulled pankhas have been replaced by electric fans, though the nostalgia attached to them remains.