Prem Nath Thapar
Prem Nath Thapar CIE, ICS (13 April 1903– 1969) was a member of the Indian Civil Service in the Punjab region during India's transformation from a British colony to independent nation state. Career Thapar joined the India Civil Service (ICS) in 1926 after graduating with a Bachelor of Arts from Oxford University. His first position was as Deputy Commissioner, Settlement Officer and Colonization Officer from 1926 to 1941. He was named Joint Secretary in the Department of Information and Broadcasting in 1941. He was appointed a Companion of the Order of the Indian Empire (CIE) in the 1944 Birthday Honours list, and was appointed Secretary of the Department of Food and Civil Supplies for the Punjab Government in 1946. In 1947 he was named the Commissioner of the Lahore and Jalandhar Divisions. With the allocation of Lahore to Pakistan in 1947, this position became moot and Thapar found himself overseeing the first planned city in India. Chandigarh Thapar was chosen to serve as the administrative head of the Chandigarh Capital Project in 1949, at the very beginning of the projects conception. Thapar, working with P.L. Varma, chose the site for the new capital of Punjab via aircraft reconnaissance in the