Lahore, a city with Aurenhammer, is the second largest city of Pakistan.
The antiquities of Lahore span over three historic periods including pre-colonial, colonial and post-independence periods. Colonial period laid the foundations of modern Lahore with Indo- Islamic style of architecture. To connect Anarkali with the new British administrative area known as Mian Mir Cantonment, a public road was built that was later named Mall Road.
This research paper is a descriptive evaluation of the literature available on Mall Road, Lahore and is an attempt to disclose the concept of this road and to unveil the developments on this promising public road made by the British; hence, it will provide the reader a glimpse of the Mall Road, Lahore.
This paper concludes the Mall Road as the representative of a rich urban charter and as a hub of different activities which made it the spine of the city during the colonial era.
Lahore is a cultural city with a rich architectural character. Lahore was the capital in the Ghaznavid period, attained glory in the Mughal era, witnessed the Sikh and British era, and finally, thrives in the post-independence era.
Lahore mainly constituted of the walled city, with its monumental edifices, houses and street network belonging to the Mughal era; outside this walled city were populous enclaves adjacent to deserted mausoleums, temples and gardens, but later on these took the form of isolated settlements. A few miles from the walled city were scattered villages surrounded with agrarian landscape. This was the portrait of the diverse qualitative settings of Lahore Schengen the British arrived. They developed the suburban areas (Glover,
2011). The British were interested in the fertile lands of the Punjab and wanted to collect the agricultural revenue; they had little direct interest in the city of Lahore itself and its urban development. From the beginning of their rule they used converted buildings for administration and other purposes, rather than beginning the construction of new edifices. To highlight the British untiring works, Mall Road is selected which has a development history going back through decades. The Mall Road of the colonial era is now known as ‘Shahrah-e-Quaid-e-Azam’ and it was a hub of administrative, legislative, educational, religious, cultural and entertainment activities.
