Delhi: Akshardham Temple Tour with Light and Water Show

Built in five years, with no steel in it

Akshardham was completed in 2005 in Rajasthani pink sandstone and Italian Carrara marble: 234 carved pillars, 148 stone elephants each different, nine domes — and no structural steel or concrete anywhere in the main monument.

It was built by traditional shilpa shastra methods, stone cut, carved and fitted the way Indian temples were built a thousand years ago, by around seven thousand craftsmen and a very large number of volunteers.

Whether or not modern temples interest you, the fact that this was attempted at all in the twenty-first century is remarkable.

The complex

Your guide takes you round before the show.

The Mandir with its carved ambulatory. The Gajendra Pith, a plinth of three thousand tonnes of stone telling elephant stories from Indian mythology — elephants with saints, with kings, with each other. And the Narayan Sarovar, the tank ringed by 108 brass cow heads and filled with water from 151 sacred rivers and lakes.

The water and light show

After dark, on the Yagnapurush Kund — the largest stepwell of its kind, built as 2,870 steps around a central lotus. Water jets, projected light, fire and a score retell a story from the Kena Upanishad about a boy who walks into fire to learn the source of life.

Fifteen minutes, and it is the reason to come in the evening.

Read this before you go

Security is airport-grade and the prohibited list is absolute: no phones, no cameras, no bags, no electronics, no food. There are free cloakrooms at the gate and the queue for them is the longest part of the visit — leave everything in the car if you can.

Modest dress required, shoulders and knees covered. Wraps are lent at the entrance.

Closed Mondays. Photography inside is impossible, which is worth knowing beforehand.

Three options

Guide only; car, driver and guide; or the same with entry and show tickets.