In the middle of New Delhi, not far from Parliament House and the corridors of power, stands a collection of giant stone structures that look more like abstract modern sculptures than anything functional. These are the surviving instruments of an 18th-century astronomical observatory. For most visitors today, however, the name Jantar Mantar evokes something entirely different: tents, placards, hunger strikes, and crowds of citizens demanding to be heard. Over three centuries, this unlikely site has transformed from a place designed to measure the heavens into India’s most recognisable public stage for dissent.
The story begins with Maharaja Sawai Jai Singh II of Amber (later Jaipur). Born in 1688, Jai Singh was a ruler with an unusual passion for mathematics, architecture and astronomy. In an age when European telescopes were becoming more sophisticated, he chose a different path. Dissatisfied with the accuracy of existing astronomical tables used for calendars, astrology and timekeeping, he decided to build large-scale masonry instruments that could be used with the naked eye. The first of these observatories rose in Delhi and was completed in 1724. It was followed by four others in Jaipur, Ujjain, Varanasi and Mathura.
The Delhi site, located just south of the old Mughal capital of Shahjahanabad, was conceived as both a scientific facility and a political statement. Some accounts link its construction to a disagreement in the Mughal court over the correct auspicious date for an imperial expedition. Jai Singh’s response was to create instruments capable of greater precision. The name “Jantar Mantar” itself comes from the Sanskrit yantra, meaning instrument or device for calculation.
Among the structures still visible are the Samrat Yantra, a towering triangular sundial whose hypotenuse is aligned with the Earth’s axis; the Jai Prakash Yantra, a pair of concave hemispheres used to map the position of celestial bodies; the Rama Yantra, two large cylindrical structures for measuring altitude and azimuth; and the Misra Yantra, a composite instrument that could indicate noon in different cities and track the solstices. These were not decorative. At the time of their construction they represented some of the most ambitious attempts in India to create permanent, large-scale tools for systematic observation. The Samrat Yantra, in particular, was designed to measure local time with remarkable accuracy for its era.
Over the following decades the observatory gradually fell into disuse. Political instability after Jai Singh’s death, the decline of Mughal authority, and the later pressures of colonial rule meant that the instruments suffered neglect and, in places, damage. By the mid-19th century the site had largely ceased to function as a working observatory. In the 20th century it was preserved as a protected monument, valued more for its architectural strangeness and historical curiosity than for active scientific work. Tourists came to walk among the geometric forms and wonder at their purpose. Few imagined that the quiet stretch of road beside them would one day become synonymous with public protest.
That change arrived in the late 20th century. For decades after Independence, the preferred location for large demonstrations in Delhi had been the Boat Club lawns near India Gate and along Rajpath. The open space offered visibility and a sense of proximity to the seat of government. That arrangement began to unravel after a series of massive agitations in the 1980s. The decisive moment came in 1988, when farmer leader Mahendra Singh Tikait of the Bharatiya Kisan Union led an estimated five lakh cultivators into the heart of the capital. For nearly a week they occupied the Boat Club area, bringing parts of the ceremonial axis of the city to a standstill. The scale of the occupation alarmed successive governments.
By 1993, authorities formally restricted large public gatherings at the Boat Club on security grounds. Protesters needed a new, still-visible location that would not completely paralyse the city centre. Jantar Mantar Road, running close to Parliament Street yet outside the most tightly controlled zones, fitted the requirement. It offered enough space for tents and stages, remained within easy reach of journalists and politicians, and was not large enough to accommodate the kind of overwhelming numbers that had occupied Rajpath. Gradually, by administrative practice rather than a single dramatic decree, it became the capital’s designated protest venue.
In the years that followed, almost every significant movement that sought national attention found its way there. Social activist Anna Hazare’s 2011 indefinite hunger strike against corruption, demanding a strong Lokpal bill, turned the site into a national focal point and drew huge crowds. Tibetan refugees, trade unions, student groups, environmental campaigners and regional movements have all used the same stretch of pavement. In 2023, some of India’s most celebrated wrestlers, including Vinesh Phogat, Bajrang Punia and Sakshi Malik, staged a prolonged protest against the then leadership of the Wrestling Federation of India. More recently, the site has continued to host student-led demonstrations and other civic campaigns, reinforcing its status as the default address for organised public dissent in the national capital.
The space is not unrestricted. Demonstrators must usually obtain prior permission from the Delhi Police. Numbers, duration and the use of loudspeakers are regulated. In 2017 the National Green Tribunal ordered a ban on protests at Jantar Mantar after residents complained of noise, sanitation problems and environmental disruption. The tribunal suggested alternative venues such as Ramlila Maidan. The Supreme Court later intervened, ruling that a complete ban on peaceful assembly at traditional sites was not acceptable and directing the authorities to frame guidelines that balanced the right to protest with the rights of local residents and the need for public order.
What makes Jantar Mantar distinctive is precisely this layered history. The same stones that once helped astronomers track the movement of planets now form the backdrop for citizens tracking the performance of governments. Its location near the centres of power gives demonstrations immediate visibility. Its relatively compact size keeps gatherings manageable. And the accumulated memory of earlier struggles has invested the place with symbolic weight that newer venues lack.
Three hundred years after Sawai Jai Singh ordered the construction of instruments to read the skies more accurately, the site continues to attract people who look outward—not only at the stars, but at the society they wish to change. Visitors still arrive to study the geometric yantras and to photograph their striking forms. Others come with banners, national flags and lists of demands. The dual identity of the place is what gives it lasting power. Jantar Mantar remains both a monument to India’s scientific past and a living arena of its democratic present.
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