NEW DELHI — The man’s last footsteps, cast in concrete, lead out from an all-white mansion to the spot where he took his final breath.

On a mild winter day, Mohandas K. Gandhi walked slowly across a stately lawn in New Delhi, India’s capital, leaning on the shoulders of two young women, when an assassin greeted him, touched his feet and then shot the frail 78-year-old three times in the chest.

The grounds where Gandhi crumpled to the ground, and the elegant mansion where he spent his final days, have been turned into a memorial to his life, and violent death. To enter, there is no security check or ticket booth. You walk in off the street, unfettered and free, just the way Gandhi would have probably liked it.

The memorial, the Gandhi Smriti, is perhaps the best place in India to contemplate the legacy of one of history’s momentous figures.