The Oberoi, New Delhi

Delhi’s top business hotel is also an Indian society favorite, and the nightly arrivals in the lobby attests as much; several excellent restaurants—including the ever-popular threesixty—make this a place to be seen as much as to stay. The revamped and expanded spa, unveiled in late 2007, features Delhi’s only heated indoor lap pool. Guest rooms are exceedingly comfortable and tastefully appointed, some with Indian antiques and textiles; outsize windows look out upon either the adjacent golf course (populated with dozens of varieties of birds) or Humayun’s Tomb in the distance. The location, in a ho-hum corner of New Delhi about 10 minutes’ drive from Connaught Place, is either a boon or a bane: you can’t walk anywhere interesting, but the space and relative quiet of the surroundings provides a sense of escape from the city.