Delhi NCR

Meeting people at Zakir Husain Delhi College

Zakir Husain Delhi College is neither North Campus nor South Campus: it sits on Jawaharlal Nehru Marg near Turkman Gate in central Delhi, and its roots go back to a madrasa founded in 1696. It is the only DU college teaching BA (Hons) Arabic and Persian, and its heritage buildings are an ASI-declared monument.

The story of Zakir Husain Delhi College

The story starts with Madrasa Ghaziuddin Khan, built at the end of the 17th century near Ajmeri Gate by Ghaziuddin Khan, a Mughal general under Aurangzeb. The complex held his tomb, a mosque and the madrasa. After a lapse, an oriental college for literature, science and art was set up on the site in 1792, and in 1824 the British East India Company grafted Delhi College onto it.

In the 19th century the college was at the centre of what historians call the Delhi Renaissance. European astronomy and mathematics entered the syllabus in 1827, a Vernacular Translation Society began translating texts into Urdu in 1832, and by 1845 it had 460 students from Hindu, Muslim and Christian families. During the 1857 revolt the college was plundered and then shut by the British, and in 1877 it was moved to Lahore despite local protests.

Delhi got its college back in the 1920s: an Anglo-Arabic college reopened in 1924, affiliated to Delhi University in 1925 and became a constituent college in 1929. It was revived as a non-denominational institution in 1948, renamed after Dr. Zakir Husain in 1975, and moved to its present building on Jawaharlal Nehru Marg in 1986. The Delhi College Archives were set up in 2008 to preserve its records.

What the campus is like socially

ZHDC feels different from the big North and South Campus names. The crowd is diverse, the departments range from Arabic, Persian and Urdu to Economics, Commerce and the sciences, and campus culture leans toward literature, debate and heritage rather than celebrity-headlined fests. Students like to say they are not even on campus-campus, and they say it with some pride.

Location shapes daily life. The college is a short ride from New Delhi Railway Station and Old Delhi, so food walks, heritage photo walks and the Ajmeri Gate bustle are part of the student experience. Day and evening colleges share the same historic site, which gives the place a friendly Day vs Evening banter.

Traditions every Zakir Husain Delhi College student knows

• Annual Convocation: ZHDC holds its own full-dress annual convocation, a rarity among DU constituent colleges and a ceremony alumni remember.
• Zakir Husain Memorial Lecture: An annual lecture, running since 2006, that brings public intellectuals to campus and leans into the college's composite, multi-faith history.
• Zakir Husain Memorial Football Tournament: Started in 1987 in memory of Dr. Zakir Husain, it is one of the longest-running inter-college football events in Delhi.
• Bhisham Sahni Book Fair: A two-day book exhibition and sale named after the Tamas author, who taught English at the college.
• Delhi College Lecture Series: A lecture series that celebrates the college's standing as one of the oldest institutions in the university.

Campus lore and insider spots

• Ghaziuddin Khan's tomb: The original Mughal complex near Ajmeri Gate still contains the founder's tomb and mosque, a surprise for anyone visiting from a newer campus.
• The oldest college debate: ZHDC students will happily remind St. Stephen's (1881) and Hindu (1899) that their own lineage goes back to 1696.
• The Lahore years: The college was moved to Lahore in 1877, and Delhi spent almost half a century without it before it came back in the 1920s.
• Heritage status: The Archaeological Survey of India declared the heritage structure a monument in 2002, so some of your college photos are technically of a protected site.

How to find your people here

Join a society or the fest committee at Zakir Husain Delhi College in your first few weeks. DU friendships tend to form around a shared activity, not the classroom, and the North or South Campus ecosystem makes it easy to meet people from other colleges too.

Fests and societies at Zakir Husain Delhi College

Notable societies

• Art and Culture Society
• MUN-Delzak Society
• Chimera Society (Photography)

Societies worth knowing at Zakir Husain Delhi College

• Debating Society: One of the college's most active societies, with both English and Hindi debating.
• MUN-Delzak Society: The college's Model United Nations society, which runs conferences and sends delegations across Delhi.
• Chimera: The photography society, with no shortage of Mughal arches and old Delhi streets to shoot.
• Art and Culture Society: Runs the cultural side of college life, from performances to the annual day.
• NSS and NCC: Both have campus units and are a popular way into community work and leadership roles.

Careers, internships and placements

ZHDC has a placement cell that runs recruitment drives, aptitude preparation and mock interviews, with commerce and economics students most active in campus hiring. Outcomes are more modest than at the big commerce brands, so many students build their own path through internships, society work and postgraduate entrance exams.

The college's Hindi, Urdu, Arabic and Persian departments feed a real pipeline into academia, translation, journalism and civil services preparation. That last route has a famous face: Drishti IAS founder Vikas Divyakirti studied at ZHDC.

Notable alumni

• Muhammad Qasim Nanautawi: Studied at Delhi College in the 19th century and went on to co-found Darul Uloom Deoband.
• Ali Sardar Jafri: The Urdu poet graduated from Zakir Husain College in 1938 after being expelled from Aligarh for political activity.
• Bhisham Sahni: Author of Tamas, appointed Lecturer in English at Delhi College in 1952. The college's book fair carries his name.
• Vikas Divyakirti: UPSC educator and Drishti IAS founder, who studied at Zakir Husain Delhi College before further degrees at DU.
• Harsh Vardhan: Former Union minister, listed among the college's alumni.

Rivalries and eternal debates

ZHDC's favourite argument is about age: its 1696 lineage versus the 1881 and 1899 founding dates of St. Stephen's and Hindu College. On the field, the rivalry plays out in inter-college football, where the college has a long tradition thanks to its own memorial tournament. Closer to home, the Day and Evening colleges share the same buildings and trade friendly jokes about who owns the campus.

What Zakir Husain Delhi College is talking about now

Heritage aesthetics are the college's strongest online look: arches, old Delhi streets and hostel photos get shared far more than classroom shots. Alumni reunion posts tied to the college's long DU history are a recurring theme on its official pages.

Meeting people at Zakir Husain Delhi College by interest

A lot of friendships here form around a shared interest rather than a class or a hostel wing. If you are into art and sketching, debating and mun, photography, theatre and dramatics, and poetry and open mics, those pages cover where that scene actually happens in India and how to find people near you who are into the same thing.

Colleges nearby

Zakir Husain Delhi College sits close to St. Stephen's College, Hindu College, Lady Shri Ram College, Miranda House, and Shri Ram College of Commerce, all part of the same Delhi NCR student scene. Cross-college friendships often start at inter-college fests, hackathons, or shared-interest communities rather than in class.

Similar campuses across India

If you are looking beyond your own campus, students at Atma Ram Sanatan Dharma College, Daulat Ram College, Deen Dayal Upadhyaya College, and Delhi School of Economics share a similar campus culture, and Zyber works the same way at each: showing you verified people nearby who match on interest, intent, or timing.

Zyber on campus

Zyber is built for meeting people nearby in real time, with verified profiles only. At Zakir Husain Delhi College, that means showing you people near you who share your interests or your drive, whether or not you overlap on a class or a society.

New to Zakir Husain Delhi College? Start here

If you are just starting out, these freshers guides are written for exactly this moment: first week of college checklist, how to choose societies in college, making friends beyond your branch, and internship in first year.

See meeting people in Delhi NCR, events in Delhi NCR, the freshers guide, the Meet People pillar, or read what Zyber is.