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In its 94-year existence, North Block has seen a lot. It was the seat of power of the colonial British government, the site of spontaneous celebrations when India became Independent in 1947, and, ever since, has been a witness to successive governments shaping policy for the nation.
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These days, however, the corridors of the building are nearly deserted, with sections roped off, and locks hanging on doors that till recently hid a flurry of activity.
The building is in the process of being emptied as part of the government’s plan to redevelop the Central Vista area – the stretch from India Gate to Rashtrapati Bhawan. North Block now is to be repurposed as a museum, with key ministries that have operated out of it since 1931 when its construction finished – including Union Ministries of Home Affairs and Finance, and the Department of Personnel and Training (DoPT) – to be moved to a set of ‘Kartavya Bhawan’ buildings down the road.
However, the work of shifting a government can’t be hurried up. And in this case is being coordinated by a ministry – Housing and Urban Affairs, which is also spearheading the Central Vista redevelopment. Other ministries have appointed a nodal officer each for the exercise, which began around a month ago.
Under their watch, files are being sorted into marked boxes, computers are being packed, and office supplies are going into cardboard containers. Artwork, including many, many photographs of Mahatma Gandhi, is being bubble-wrapped. The packing is being done by office staff, aided by a team of workers hired for the job.
A portrait of Mahatma Gandhi wrapped for shifting. (Damini Nath)
Once packed, the boxes are carried by workers down the stairs to a side entrance, and loaded onto tempos and government cars. These then cover the short distance to the new address.
An official working in North Block says the move has been fairly smooth so far, particularly when it comes to files, given that nearly all, save the sensitive ones, are now on the government’s E-Office portal.
Officials in the know say the DoPT has almost entirely moved out. Jitendra Singh, the Minister of State for Prime Ministers’ Office, Science and Technology and Personnel, is expected to shift soon, sources said.
The Home Ministry has been allotted Kartavya Bhawan 3, and Union Home Secretary Govind Mohan and the Intelligence Bureau were some of the first ones to shift. According to sources, the shifting of some offices to KB3, as the building is referred to, began before its formal inauguration by Prime Minister Narendra Modi on August 6.
The Finance Ministry, however, is yet to begin shifting.
An officer in the middle of shifting says: “I’m soaking in the last few days at this building. Many of my former colleagues who have worked here have been dropping by to see the offices one last time.”
Several key ministries will move out of the North Block.
Like the South Block that stands across it, North Block, designed by British architect Herbert Baker in red sandstone, incorporating Indian features like jaali, chajja and chhattri, is as much a regal structure as a functional one, with plenty of light and ventilation.
The new buildings, in comparison, look like any modern corporate office, with glass cabins for officers, open plan seating for most employees and access-control systems.
Offices in the South Block, which houses the Prime Minister’s Office and the Ministries of Defence and External Affairs, have not started moving out yet.
Once both the buildings are emptied, they are to be restored and refurbished, before reopening as Yuge Yugeen National Museum. The government claims it will be the largest museum in the world.
The “charm” of North Block is what those who have worked here keep coming back to in conversations. G K Pillai, who spent seven years in North Block, first as Joint Secretary from 1996 to 2001 and then as Union Home Secretary from 2009 to 2011, recalls the sense of history that permeates the rooms.
“Stalwarts, including Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel, worked here. Old-timers would tell us about important meetings that took place in the past,” Pillai, who is now retired, says.
The former IAS officer adds that he personally believes that not all the ministries from North Block and South Block should have been shifted to the new quarters. “Some of them could have stayed. The next generation of officers will lose that sense of history,” says Pillai.
Items from a ministry packed and stacked before shifting. (Damini Nath)
Durga Shanker Mishra, a 1984-batch IAS officer who retired as Uttar Pradesh Chief Secretary last year, recalls his time in a ground-floor North Block office as Director (Personnel) in the Home Ministry in 2002-2004. “I have good memories of that office. Though I was a director in Home, I had been given a room on the Finance Ministry’s side. It was a well-sized room.”
However, Mishra says: “As is the case with old buildings, there were challenges. It needed more maintenance over the years.”
As Secretary, Housing and Urban Affairs, Mishra was, in fact, part of the deliberations when the Central Vista project was planned and started. He says the new Central Secretariat buildings will change the way the government works, in terms of efficiency and coordination.
In fact, while senior officers – who along with ministers had large airy offices – are understandably nostalgic about the high-ceilinged large rooms that they are leaving behind, not all in the North Block will regret the change.
A majority of its employees worked in cramped spaces, with partitions created within dingy rooms to accommodate more officials over the years. Mezzanine levels were also added to create space, with the temporary additions doubling the number of rooms in both North and South Blocks over the years.
A section official says: “We are looking forward to the new building. I’ve heard that the canteen is very nice.”
But true to form, the open-plan layout of the new Secretariat also has its share of detractors. On August 5, the Central Secretariat Service Forum, which represents around 13,000 employees, wrote a letter to the Prime Minister’s Office expressing concerns about “the lack of privacy and confidentiality” in the new arrangement.
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