T.N.’s seat of power: never-ending talk of shifting Assembly-Secretariat complex

Tamil Nadu legislature debates moving from historic Fort St George to modern complexes, facing opposition and controversy over the years.

The 102-year-old Tamil Nadu legislature has been holding its sittings at Fort St George, a prominent vestige of the colonial era, for most of these years. The Fort has also been the prime seat of power of the State government. Yet, the idea of shifting the Assembly-Secretariat complex to different places caught the attention of the authorities at different points of time.

More than 40 years ago, the authorities had spotted the inadequacy of Fort St. George in accommodating the requirements of a growing welfarist government, which has been co-existing with the legislature. In May 1983, the then AIADMK government, headed by M.G. Ramachandran, issued an order to raise a structure that would house the Secretariat. But this was given up subsequently.

Nearly 20 years later, MGR’s successor, Jayalalithaa, suddenly floated the idea of building an Administrative City near Mamallapuram on the outskirts of the city, as she told the Assembly in May 2002 that the present Secretariat complex was not sufficient. She also pointed out that one-third of the area was taken up by the defence forces (which, along with the Archaeological Survey of India, hold control of the complex). Even as her government pursued this idea, she announced, a year later, that the 30-acre Queen Mary’s College complex would be the site for the Secretariat.

Intervening in the debate on grants for the Education Department (which combined School and Higher Education Departments then) in April 2003, the then Chief Minister described the Secretariat complex as “unfit for human habitation” and found fault with the 10-storey Namakkal Kavignar Malligai, which, she said, was conceived with a narrow vision, of only providing office space. She then compared the Fort complex with the Secretariat complexes in other States such as Andhra Pradesh, Karnataka, and Gujarat, where, Jayalalithaa said, several facilities, such as an Assembly complex, a conference hall, and a guest house, had been established. Jayalalithaa went to the extent of saying that the new Secretariat complex, opposite the Marina beach, would be an “exquisite mix of the facade of the Vidhan Soudha [in Bengaluru] and modern interiors of the Vigyan Bhavan in New Delhi.”

Legal and political controversies marred the proposed project as students of the college were opposed to the government’s plan to demolish buildings of their institution. Heritage lovers and educationists, too, were against the idea of raising a new Secretariat complex at the site that was accommodating the college. At one stage, M.K. Stalin, an Opposition MLA then and Chief Minister now, lent his support to the agitating students, leading to his arrest.

In September that year, the AIADMK government abandoned the proposal and turned to an area of about 43 acres at Kotturpuram where institutions of higher studies such as the Anna University and the Madras School of Economics had been functioning.

The Chennai Metropolitan Development Authority was asked by the government to select the architect and the builder and mobilise an estimated ₹300 crore for the complex that would include the Assembly.