10 Places to Visit in Lahore

The Badshahi Masjid was ordered officially by the Mughal Emperor Aurangzeb, with the making of the mosque lasting for two years until 1873, located in Lahore - the capital of Pakistani province of Punjab. This mosque is located west of Lahore Fort, along the outskirts of the walled city of Lahore. The mosque is accepted to be one of the most buildings made in conventional Mughal era buildings of Lahore. It remains the largest and most recent grand mosques of Mughal empire era.

The Wazir Khan Mosque was officially allowed to be built during the rule of Mughal Emperor Shah Jahan as part of a group of buildings that also included the nearby Shahi Hammam baths. The building of Wazir Khan Mosque started in 1634 and was finalised in 1641, located in Lahore - the provincal capital of Pakistani province of Punjab. It is said to be the most highly decorated Mughal time period mosque, Wazir Khan Mosque is famous for its very complicated faience tile work known as kashi-kari, as well as its interior upper layers that are almost fully made more attractive with detailed Mughal time period walls and ceiling painted with water colours. The mosque has been under large restoration since 2009 under the guidance of the Aga Khan Trust for Culture and the Government of Punjab, with funds from the governments of Germany, Norway, and the United States.

The Data Darbar is the largest Muslim holy place. It is a place regarded as holy to Muslims because of its association to a holy person - Hazrat Data Ganj Baksh across South Asia. It was built to house the remains of the Muslim person who believed in the spiritual apprehension of truths that are beyond the intellect, Abul Hassan Ali Hujwiri, commonly known as Data Ganj Baksh, who is considered to have lived on the site in the 11th century located in the city of Lahore, Punjab, Pakistan The site is accepted to be the most dedicated place for religious purpose in Lahore, and hosts up to one million visitors to its site on its yearly timed festival known as urs in urdu - the national language of Pakistan. The place considered to be holy because of its association with Data Ganj Baksh, was originally made as a simple grave next to the mosque which Hujwiri had built on the outskirts of Lahore in the 11th century. By the 13th century, the belief that the spiritual powers of great Sufi saints were attached to their burial sites was overall in the Muslim world, and so a larger shrine was built to mark the burial site of Hujwiri during the Mughal rule. The place associated to the holy person mentioned above building complex size was increased in the 19th century, and Hujwiri’s mosque was built again.

Minar-e-Pakistan is a public building made to celebrate the Lahore Resolution commonly known as Pakistan Resoulution. The tower was built and completed on March 22 1968, the place where the All-India Muslim League passed the Lahore Resolution on 23 March 1940 - the first official document for a separate individual and sovereign homeland for the Muslims of British India, as adopted by the two-nation theory.

It is situated next to the Walled City of Lahore, in the Pakistani province of Punjab. The tower was designed and supervised by, an architect and engineer originally from Punjab. The foundation stone was laid on 23 March 1960. Construction took eight years, and was completed on 21 October 1968 at an estimated cost of Rs 7,058,000 which is 7 million and fifty eight thousand Pak Rupees in 1968. The money was collected by putting an additional tax on cinema and horse racing tickets at the demand of Akhtar Hussain, the governor of West Pakistan from September 1957 to April 1960. Today, the gracefully thin tower provides a wide view surrounding the observer which includes all aspects of the subjective tower to its visitors who can’t go up the stairs or reach the top, by using an elevator. The park around the building made to celebrate the adoption of Lahore resolution which lead to the making of Islamic Republic of Pakistan include fountains made from marble and a lake made by humans and it did not occur or was made naturally. The Park around the Minar -e- Pakistan is called Greater Iqbal Park as in today on 25/01/2018.The Lahore Museum was originally made from 1865-1866 on the place of the hall or building of the 1864 Punjab Exhibition and later transfered to the present place made on The Mall Road, Lahore, Punjab, Pakistan in 1894. A museum is a place where objects of historical, scientific, cultural and artistic are displayed, John Lockwood Kipling, was one of the earliest and most famous person who had the responsibility of taking care of the museum and it is called a custodian. The next custodian was K. N. Sitaram. There were over 250,000 visitors were registered in 2005. The current building of Lahore Museum was designed by the very famous architect Sir Ganga Ram. The museum is the largest museum of the country. A number of rooms have been under repair for a longer period of time and others still show a rather historical and often limited to basic principles in connection with the display of objects in the museum, with Urdu titles only.

The Lahore Zoo in Lahore, Punjab, Pakistan, originally made in 1872, is one of the largest zoos across South Asia. A zoo is a place where a collection of wild animals are kept mostly in a park or garden for study, protection from extinction and display for the public. It is currently supervised, managed and taken care by the Forest, Wildlife and Fisheries department of the Government of Pakistan. Today the zoo is a home to a collection of about 1380 animals from 136 types of animal. Each type consists of similar type of animals capable of exchanging genes or interbreeding. Lahore Zoo was the venue of the 5th annual conference of SAZARC in 2004.The declared mission of the zoo is to carry out protection and livelihood of different types of animals and to actively participate to Pakistan’s International responsibility with regards of the Convention on Biological Diversity in addition to provide best educational and recreational facilities.

Lahore Zoo is considered to be the third or fourth oldest zoo in the world. Vienna Zoo of Austria, made in 1752 as a collection of wild animals kept in captivity for exhibition, was allowed to public view as a zoo in 1779. London Zoo of England, established in 1828, was opened to public in 1847. The Alipore Zoo of India, established sometime in the early 19th century, was opened to public as a zoo in 1876.Shalimar Gardens was built by the Mughal Emperor Shah Jahan, a Mughal garden complex in Lahore in 1637, located at Lahore - the capital of the Pakistani province of Punjab. The Shalimar Gardens were laid out as a Persian paradise garden. The gardens measures 658 metres by 258 metres and cover an area of 16 hectares east of Lahore’s walled city.

The gardens are enclosed by a brick wall that is famous for its intricate fretwork.

The Sheesh Mahal was constructed under the reign of Mughal Emperor Shah Jahan from 1631-1632, located in Shah Burj block in north west corner of Lahore fort, Lahore - the capital city of Pakistani province of Punjab. The ornate white marble pavilion is inlaid with pietra dura and complex mirror-work of the finest quality. The hall was reserved for personal use by the imperial family and close aides. It is among the 21 monuments that were built by successive Mughal emperors inside Lahore Fort, and forms the “jewel in the Fort’s crown”. [1] As part of the larger Lahore Fort Complex, it has been inscribed as a UNESCO World Heritage Site since 1981.The tomb of Mughal Emperor Jahangir was built in the reign of Mughal Emperor Shah Jahan, who ordered that a “mausoleum befitting an Emperor” should be built in his father’s honour to inter his remains. The tomb was built for Emperor Jahangir, who ruled the Mughal Empire from 1605 to 1627. The emperor died in the foothills of Kashmir near the town of Rajauri. A funeral procession transferred his body from Kashmir and arrived in Lahore on Friday, 12 November 1627. The tomb is located in Shahdara Bagh, northwest of the Walled City of Lahore. The tomb is located across the River Ravi from Lahore, in what was a rural area known for its numerous pleasure gardens. The tomb in located in Nur Jahan’s pleasure garden, the Dilkusha After the fall of the Mughal Empire, the Lahore Fort was used as the residence of Ranjit Singh, founder of the Sikh Empire. The fort then passed to British colonialists after they annexed Punjab following their victory over the Sikhs at the Battle of Gujrat in February 1849. In 1981, the fort was inscribed as a UNESCO World Heritage Site for its “outstanding repertoire” of Mughal monuments dating from the era when the empire was at its artistic and aesthetic zenith.

The Lahore Fort contains 21 notable monuments, some of which date to the era of Emperor Akbar. The Lahore Fort is notable for having been almost entirely rebuilt in the 17th century, when the Mughal Empire was at the height of its splendour and opulence. After the fall of the Mughal Empire, the Lahore Fort was used as the residence of Ranjit Singh, founder of the Sikh Empire. The fort then passed to British colonialists after they annexed Punjab following their victory over the Sikhs at the Battle of Gujrat in February 1849. In 1981, the fort was inscribed as a UNESCO World Heritage Site for its “outstanding repertoire” of Mughal monuments dating from the era when the empire was at its artistic and aesthetic zenith.