Renowned architect, town planner and art collector, Kuldip Singh, died of COVID-19 on November 10 in Delhi. He was 86.
The stalwart designed the Delhi Civic Centre, National Cooperative Development Corporation (NCDC), Palika Kendra building opposite Jantar Mantar, among other projects. He also gave regular consultations for the development of Delhi Metro.
Singh admired Urdu poetry, and later grew passionate towards building an exquisite collection of Thanjavur paintings. A few of his friends, all luminaries in their respective fields, remember him as a gentle and dignified personality.
Raj Rewal, architect and Singh’s former business partner
Kuldip was a very rationalist architect and chose the building material in a quite sensitive manner. His projects in Delhi stood the test of time and depicted the highly-creative use of raw concrete in a beautiful manner. His other work, the Marine Drive development project in Kochi, has also been quite well-received. Kuldip kept great interest in poetry and would often quote poet Muhammad Iqbal and other renowned names in his conversations. He dedicated the last years of his life collecting iconic Thanjavur paintings. He was unmarried, and some of us used to joke with him that his collection was his family. His death is a big loss to all of us.
Ram Rahman, photographer and curator
I know Kuldip from a young age because of my father Habib Rahman, an architect himself. Kuldip designed many iconic buildings in the city. His buildings are sculptural in nature. Three years ago with Kiran Nadar Museum of Art, I curated Delhi: Building the Modern, an exhibition that featured the beautiful models of buildings designed by Singh, my father and other key architects Raj Rewal, Achyut Kanvinde, and Charles Correa. Eventually, he became absolutely fascinated with Thanjavur paintings and built the best collection in India, and came to be known as quite a scholar in his new chosen field.
He later donated the collection to Mumbai’s Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj Vastu Sangrahalaya. I used to joke with him on his fascination for Thanjavur paintings, saying, “How come a sardar has become a scholar of the South?” Kuldip was a gentle, quiet, dignified person.
Roobina Karode, Director and Chief-Curator, Kiran Nadar Museum of Art
He was a gentleman. I came to know more about him when we planned an exhibition in 2017 on his Thanjavur collection titled Amruta Kalasha: Thanjavur and Other South Indian Paintings. He told me that during his project in Kochi, he learnt about the art form, which later became almost a pressing need for him to document the culture.
Marg magazine also brought out a book dedicated to his collection. In another show, co-curated by Ram Rahman and myself, we showcased the modern architecture in India, of which one of the key figures was Kuldip Singh.
Kuldip Singh, Raj Rewal, Mahendra Singh are some of the architects who translated Pandit Jawaharlal Nehru’s vision of modernising the capital city. Nehru spoke with these people and his idea was to bring artists and architecture together. In this way, Kuldip’s contribution to the city, using modern materials, is immense.