Shopping in Delhi: Where to Go, What It Should Cost, How to Bargain

Delhi has two shopping systems running side by side and mixing them up is what makes people feel cheated.

Fixed-price: the state emporiums on Baba Kharak Singh Marg, Khan Market, Dilli Haat and the malls. The label is the price. Asking for a discount marks you out and gets you nowhere.

Negotiated: Chandni Chowk, Janpath, Sarojini Nagar, Paharganj, and the pavement stalls anywhere. The first number is an opening position and both sides know it.

In the second system the useful habit is to decide what the thing is worth to you before you ask, then let the number arrive. Counter at roughly half, settle somewhere near two-thirds, and be genuinely willing to walk, because walking is the only real leverage either side has. It is a routine transaction, not a confrontation; treating it as a fight is both unpleasant and ineffective.

A local guide changes the arithmetic more than any tactic does, because the opening number quoted in their presence is different from the one quoted to you alone.

On Baba Kharak Singh Marg near Connaught Place, each Indian state runs its own crafts emporium. Kashmir has the pashmina and the carpets, Rajasthan the blue pottery and block print, Uttar Pradesh the Agra marble inlay, Karnataka the sandalwood, Odisha the ikat.

They are government-run, fixed-price, and the quality is checked. You will not get a market bargain and you will not get a fake either, which for a carpet or a pashmina is the trade most visitors should take. If you have one afternoon and want to buy something real from several states without visiting them, this is the building.

Central Cottage Industries Emporium on Janpath is the same idea under one roof and is the single most efficient stop in the city for gifts.

Chandni Chowk is not a shopping street so much as a set of specialist lanes, and knowing which lane you want is the whole game.

Katra Neel for fabric by the metre. Dariba Kalan for silver, where the trade is old enough that most shops will weigh and price by the gram in front of you. Kinari Bazaar for the trim, tassels and zardozi that go on wedding clothes, which is the most photogenic lane in Delhi and costs nothing to walk. Khari Baoli for spices, wholesale, in quantities that assume you are a restaurant.

Go in the morning. By afternoon the lanes are at full density and you will spend your energy on navigation rather than looking. Metro to Chandni Chowk on the Yellow Line, then walk or take a cycle-rickshaw; a car cannot enter and a taxi will leave you at the mouth of it anyway.

Dilli Haat (INA, Blue and Pink Lines) is an open-air crafts market with a small entry fee where artisans from every state rotate through stalls. Prices are higher than a street market and lower than an emporium, mild bargaining is accepted, and the food court is a genuinely good way to eat across India in one sitting.

Janpath is the tourist market next to Connaught Place: cotton clothing, silver, bags, Tibetan trinkets. Bargain hard, expect the first price to be several times the last.

Sarojini Nagar is where Delhi actually shops for clothes: export surplus at very low prices, with the labels sometimes still in them. It is crowded, it is chaotic, sizes are unpredictable, and the rewards are real if you are willing to dig. Cash only in most stalls.

Khan Market is the opposite end entirely: bookshops, delis, tailors and quiet cafés at genuinely high prices. Fixed price, no bargaining, and the best bookshops in the city.

Two rules that save trouble at the airport and at home.

Anything over 100 years old cannot legally be exported from India without an Archaeological Survey certificate, and genuine antiques are rarely sold to tourists in markets for this reason. If a stall tells you a piece is antique, it is either not for export or not antique. Assume the second.

Ivory and any wildlife product, including shahtoosh, are illegal to buy and to carry. Shahtoosh in particular is sometimes offered as a very fine pashmina; the difference is that the animal has to die for it. Pashmina from a licensed emporium is the thing you actually want.

Beyond that: be wary of "government emporium" signs that are not on Baba Kharak Singh Marg, and of drivers who offer to take you to a better shop than the one you named. That detour is a commission, and you pay it in the price.