Delhi, the capital city of India and the second largest city of India has been expanding its residential and commercial development to the west and south, plus the satellite towns of Noida, Gurgaon and Faridabad. Delhi and the National Capital Region (NCR) are projected to be the world’s third largest cities by 2015.

Integrated townships are being developed, and with new roads and expressways, and the extension of the Delhi Metro, will witness tremendous progress. The ambitious expansion of the Delhi Metro will also see these cities being connected to the NCR and Delhi.

Delhi and the NCR continues to attract leading domestic and international players, including IT and ITES majors, automobile manufacturers, retailers, luxury goods brands, the financial sector leaders, besides educational institutions, healthcare service providers, and hotels and resorts.

The Indira Gandhi International Airport is expected to reach saturation levels by 2015. The government is considering plans for a new airport on the outskirts of the capital at Jewar near Greater Noida on 1,000 hectares of land, and could cost up to Rs50 billion.

The Japanese government has shown interest in the Delhi- Mumbai rail corridor, and there are plans to invest a whopping $50 billion in a Delhi-Mumbai Industrial Corridor (DMIC), on the lines of the Tokyo- Osaka industrial corridor.

These developments will trigger off a huge demand for housing, commercial and retail space in the NCR, and also in the neighbouring districts of several states bordering Delhi, including Haryana, Rajasthan and Uttar Pradesh. In fact, the impact is being felt even in states such as Uttarakhand and Punjab, besides the Union Territory of Chandigarh.

Malls with a built-up space of over one million sq ft have become the norm, and bigger ones exceeding 2.5 million sq ft are also being promoted in the NCR. The inflow of IT and ITes players to the urban conglomerate has seen rentals and capital values soar in recent months

There has been a spate of major announcements made for the region, in terms of new special economic zones (SEZs), airports, container depots, and other major investments. The Indian Railways is planning to put up dedicated freight corridors, linking Delhi to Mumbai and to Kolkata, boosting developments along both sides of the corridors.

Noida, Greater Noida and Ghaziabad in UP, together with Gurgaon, Faridabad and Manesar in Haryana – which are all within the NCR – are among the fastest growing cities in the world today.