Urban beautification projects in India form a growing field of research within critical urban studies. This paper examines beautification processes at the main bazaar in Leh (Ladakh), a small town in the Indian Himalaya. As the district capital, Leh is the site of divergent discourses on the development of urban space. We highlight the significant impact of the JNURRM/UIDSSMT programme as a current development intervention in Ladakh. Drawing from postcolonial approaches and Urban Political Ecology, we analyse what different actor groups understand by urban development and modernity and how these concepts are then materialized by restructuring and beautifying the town. We argue that different positions of power shape the urban design and that the urban elites from India especially, in the form of an ever-growing number of tourists, directly influence the imaginaries of urban development in Leh. Analysing the socio-ecological entanglements within the process of beautification in Leh, the case study aims at contributing to research in the urban political ecologies of beautification in small and medium-sized towns in India and highlights the need to consider local particularities.