Tulip Garden Srinagar 2027: Indira Gandhi Memorial Tulip Garden Visitor Guide

The Tulip Garden in Srinagar, officially the Indira Gandhi Memorial Tulip Garden, is the largest tulip garden in Asia, about 30 hectares of terraced beds on the Zabarwan foothills above Dal Lake. It opens for only about four weeks each spring, usually from mid or late March to mid April, and the beds peak in the last days of March and the first ten days of April.

Is the Tulip Garden open now? No, it is closed for the season.

The garden opens only in spring. For 2027, expect the gates to open between about 15 and 26 March and stay open for roughly four weeks. The Floriculture Department usually announces the date one to two weeks ahead, and we update this page the day it does.

Before the tulips, the site was Siraj Bagh. The garden opened in 2007 to start the Kashmir tourist season a month earlier than before. The beds step up the slope towards the hills, and hyacinths, ranunculus, daffodils and muscari flower between them.

In 2026 it opened on 16 March with about 18 lakh tulips of more than 70 varieties (All India Radio). Entry that season cost Rs 75 for Indian adults, Rs 30 for children and Rs 200 for foreign nationals, and the gates were open from 9 am to 7 pm. Plan 1.5 to 2.5 hours inside, and pair it with the Mughal gardens a few minutes down the road. For everything else in the city, see our Srinagar travel guide.

When Does the Tulip Garden Srinagar Open? 2027 Dates and Past Seasons

The Tulip Garden Srinagar opens in the second half of March. In each of the last five seasons the gates opened between 16 and 26 March, and they stayed open for about four weeks. The annual Tulip Festival, which the government runs to promote Kashmir as a spring destination, is held in the garden during the same weeks.

There is no fixed opening date. The Floriculture Department opens the gates once enough beds are in colour, and that depends on how warm February and March have been. Here is what happened in each of the last five seasons.

Our 2027 forecast. The garden is most likely to open between 15 and 26 March 2027, with the fullest bloom from about the last days of March to around 10 April. A warm March pulls the date forward, as it did in 2026. A late snowfall pushes it back. If you are booking flights now, aim for 28 March to 8 April and keep one flexible day in Srinagar. That window has caught peak bloom in every season from 2022 to 2026.

Eid-ul-Fitr is expected around 10 March 2027, which is likely to fall before the garden opens this time. In 2026 Eid landed in the first week of the season, and local reports counted about 48,000 visitors over those three days.

Best Time to Visit the Tulip Garden: Bloom Calendar Week by Week

The best time to visit the Tulip Garden is the second and third week after it opens, usually the last days of March and the first ten days of April. The bulbs are planted in phases with early, mid and late-flowering varieties, which is why the show lasts about a month instead of a week.

March in Srinagar means daytime highs of about 14 °C and nights near 3 °C. By mid-April days reach about 20 °C. If you want the rest of the valley in the same trip, our guide to the best time to visit Srinagar covers each month, and Badamwari's almond blossom usually peaks in March, just before the tulips.

Tulip Garden Ticket Price and Timings

The Tulip Garden ticket price in 2026 was Rs 75 for Indian adults, Rs 30 for children and Rs 200 for foreign nationals (Time Out), and the garden was open from 9 am to 7 pm every day of the season. The 2027 rates are set by the Floriculture Department and published a few days before opening. Rates have changed between seasons before, so treat the 2026 figures as a guide.

• Buy at the gate or from the Floriculture Department. Counters run at the garden itself, and the department has offered online booking in recent seasons. QR-code booking points have also been set up at places such as Srinagar Airport.

• Skip the WhatsApp resellers. Some ticket sites quote Rs 120 or Rs 220 for a Rs 75 gate ticket.

• Ignore the "website" on Google Maps. The link shown on the garden's map listing, dofkashmir.com, points to an unrelated site as of October 2026. Do not enter payment details there.

• Photography is allowed. Phones and cameras are fine. Stay on the paths and do not step into the beds or pick flowers.

Our Tulip Garden entry fees and timings pages carry the short version of this table.

Inside the Garden: What You Will See

The Indira Gandhi Memorial Tulip Garden is planted in colour blocks. Each bed holds a single variety, so whole strips of a terrace turn red, yellow, purple or white together, and from the lower paths the slope reads as stripes of colour running up to the hills. The garden showed about 18 lakh tulips of more than 70 varieties in 2026, up from 68 varieties in 2022. Look for the near-black Queen of Night tulips, the feathered parrot tulips and the fringed ones with ragged edges.

A water channel with fountains runs down the centre. Walk all the way to the top terrace before you start taking pictures. From there you see the beds below you, and Dal Lake spread out beyond them. Between the tulip beds are hyacinths, daffodils, muscari and ranunculus, which flower at the same time. The cool air coming down the Zabarwan slope keeps the flowers fresh into the afternoon.

During the Tulip Festival the government usually adds cultural evenings with Kashmiri folk music, and stalls outside the garden sell handicrafts and cups of kahwa. Toilets and drinking water points are inside. Leave about 2 hours for the garden itself and another 45 minutes if you add the Botanical Garden next door.

Tips for Visiting the Tulip Garden

• Be at the gate at 9 am. The light is soft, the beds are fresh and the tour buses arrive later. Late afternoon, from about 5 pm, is the second-best window.

• Go on a weekday. Sundays and local holidays such as Navroz (21 March) bring the biggest local crowds.

• Dress in layers. A 9 am start can be 5 °C and lunchtime 15 °C. Wear shoes with grip, because the terraces slope and the paths are damp in the morning.

• Carry some cash for the counter and the kahwa stalls in case the network is slow.

• Keep one flexible day. The opening date moves by up to 10 days from year to year, and rain can wash out a morning.

• Combine it with the Botanical Garden and Chashme Shahi, both within 1.5 km, before lunch.

More practical pointers are on our Tulip Garden tips page.

How to Reach Tulip Garden in Srinagar

The Tulip Garden is on Cheshma Shahi Road, on the east side of Dal Lake. It is 8 km from Lal Chowk and about 6 km from Dal Gate, a 15 to 25 minute taxi or auto ride in season traffic. From Sheikh ul-Alam International Airport it is 22 km, and from Srinagar railway station (Nowgam) it is 18 km (District Srinagar).

Coming by train, the Vande Bharat from Katra has run to Srinagar since June 2025, and through trains from Jammu Tawi since May 2026, so you no longer have to finish the journey by road from Jammu. Most visitors stay on the Boulevard or in a Dal Lake houseboat and take a taxi from there. Full routes from Delhi, Mumbai, Chandigarh and Kolkata are on our how to reach Tulip Garden page.

Places to Visit Near the Tulip Garden

The Tulip Garden sits at the start of Srinagar's garden belt, so you can join it to half a dozen other sights without backtracking. Distances below are road kilometres from the garden gate.

Mughal Gardens. Located close to the Tulip Garden, the Mughal Gardens were laid out in the 17th century: Shalimar Bagh by Emperor Jahangir, Nishat Bagh by Asaf Khan, Chashme Shahi by Ali Mardan Khan for Shah Jahan, and Pari Mahal by Prince Dara Shikoh. They are planted with chinar and cypress trees, flower beds and long water channels.

Shankaracharya Temple. It stands on Shankaracharya hill and is dedicated to Lord Shiva. Tradition dates the shrine to around 200 BC, while the current stone structure is said to date from about the 9th century AD.

A sunset shikara from Dal Gate is the easiest way to end a tulip day. Shalimar, built by Emperor Jahangir around 1620, keeps its Black Pavilion of black marble on the upper terrace, so leave time to walk all the way up.

A 1-Day Tulip-Season Itinerary in Srinagar

Plan a Tulip-Season Trip to Kashmir

Late March to mid-April is one of the busiest stretches of the year in Srinagar, and hotels near the Boulevard fill as soon as the opening date is announced. Book early and ask for a free date change. Two of our packages are built around the garden: the Kashmir Tulip Festival 4N/5D tour and the Kashmir Tulip Festival Delight 4N/5D, both with a Tulip Garden visit in Srinagar plus Gulmarg and Pahalgam. If you want to build your own route, start from our Srinagar tour packages or the wider Kashmir tour packages, and couples can look at Kashmir honeymoon packages.

History: From Siraj Bagh to Asia's Largest Tulip Garden

The site was known as Siraj Bagh and run by the Floriculture Department as the Model Floriculture Centre. It was turned into a tulip garden and opened to the public in 2007 under the then Chief Minister Ghulam Nabi Azad (some government pages give 2008 as the first full season). The idea was simple. Kashmir's tourist season used to start in May, and a spring flower show would bring visitors a month earlier. It worked. The garden grew from about 15 lakh tulips in 2022 to about 18 lakh in 2026, and footfall rose from 3.65 lakh in 2023 to a record 8.55 lakh in 2025. It was later named after former Prime Minister Indira Gandhi, and the Tulip Festival is now the opening event of the Kashmir tourism year.

The Tulip Garden gives you about four weeks a year, so the trip is all about timing. Aim for the last days of March or the first week of April, arrive at 9 am, and keep a day free in case the opening slips. Planning the rest of the valley? See our list of places to visit in Kashmir. If you are in Delhi this spring instead, the Delhi Tulip Festival is a different, smaller show in the capital.

Based on Kashmir trips planned by the TravelTriangle Kashmir desk. Season dates, ticket rates and visitor numbers are checked against District Srinagar, All India Radio and Kashmir press reports for every season since 2022, and road distances were mapped from the garden gate in October 2026.

Edited by TravelTriangle