Sobha Singh was born at Hadali in Khushab district in 1890 and went to Delhi as a young contractor when the new capital was being built after 1911.
He was one of the principal contractors on New Delhi. His firms built substantial parts of the Secretariat blocks, All India Radio's building, the National Museum, Baroda House, the India Gate area and a great deal else, working under Lutyens and Baker.
He became one of the largest landowners in Delhi and was known, half admiringly and half otherwise, as the man who owned half the city.
He was a member of the Council of State and was knighted in 1944.
His son Khushwant Singh wrote about him and about Hadali for sixty years.
A Punjabi contractor from a village in Khushab district built the physical fabric of the capital of India, and there is no plaque anywhere in Delhi that says so.
He built a large part of New Delhi as a contractor under Lutyens and Baker, including work on the secretariat blocks and on the commercial centre at Connaught Place.
He came from Hadali in Shahpur district, which is also Khushwant Singh's village. Khushwant Singh was his son.
He was one of a small group of Punjabi contractors who built imperial Delhi and then owned a great deal of it, and the family properties are among the largest private landholdings in the city.