Chennai: Chief Minister C Joseph Vijay on Thursday announced that a new integrated Secretariat complex will be build here in an expansive area of 2 million square feet at an estimated cost of Rs 1,200 crore, marking the …

Chennai: Chief Minister C Joseph Vijay on Thursday announced that a new integrated Secretariat complex will be build here in an expansive area of 2 million square feet at an estimated cost of Rs 1,200 crore, marking the Tamil Nadu government’s second attempt to move from the historic Fort St. George to a more spacious facility.However, Vijay did not announce the location of the new complex though sources told DH that four sites in the Foreshore Estate, Guindy, Nandambakkam, and Koyambedu have been shortlisted. With this, Vijay has become the fourth Tamil Nadu Chief Minister to revive the topic of shifting the Secretariat to a new, sprawling campus.Vijay’s sports push| Tamil Nadu to build Olympic City and Motor Sports City The Chief Minister is already planning to move his office from the Fort building to a sprawling conference hall with an area of about 5,000 square feet in the adjacent Namakkal Kavignar Maaligai overlooking the Bay of Bengal. This will serve as the Chief Minister’s Office until the entire government machinery shifts to the proposed new building. In 2006, then Chief Minister M Karunanidhi announced that the Secretariat would be built inside the Omandurar Government Estate complex on the arterial Anna Salai, and it was completed in 2010. Karunanidhi and his ministerial colleagues moved to the new building, with Assembly sessions and Cabinet meetings conducted there, but Jayalalithaa, who won the 2011 elections, decided to return to Fort St. George.Making a statement under Rule 110 in the Tamil Nadu Assembly, Vijay said over the past 40 years, the number of employees across all government departments and administrative responsibilities within the Secretariat have increased significantly. “However, because the current infrastructure remains largely unchanged, it has reached a state of stagnation. Furthermore, since the remaining spaces in Fort St. George are Defence and ASI lands, additional buildings and development works cannot be undertaken,” he added.He contended that establishing an integrated new Secretariat complex is essential for Tamil Nadu’s future administrative growth, efficient governance, and the creation of world-class public administration infrastructure. “…to meet the needs of the next hundred years, a new building complex comprising a modern assembly and secretariat with advanced facilities will be created in Chennai across an area of 2 million square feet at an estimated cost of Rs 1,200 crore,” the Chief Minister added. He also said that in the new Secretariat building, all government departments will be brought together and integrated into a single administrative campus, which will be built complying with fire safety standards, accessibility for persons with disabilities, and green building standards.Vijay will be the second Chief Minister to function out of Fort St. George — a 400-year-old building — continuing a tradition largely broken by Karunanidhi, who moved to a modern Secretariat built under his supervision in 2010.’Don’t walk out, hear my reply on Monday’: Tamil Nadu CM Vijay challenges DMK in HouseHowever, his successor, J Jayalalithaa, moved the Secretariat back to the 17th-century building and converted the new building into a multi-specialty hospital. In 2002, Moving the Secretariat to a sprawling campus is not a new topic in Tamil Nadu, but a recurring one. It all started with then Chief Minister M G Ramachandran talking about shifting the Secretariat to a new place — he even proposed moving the state capital to Tiruchirappalli — in the 1980s, but his plans never succeeded.Two decades later, his successor, Jayalalithaa, first announced that a new Secretariat complex would come up at the Queen Mary’s College complex overlooking Marina Beach, but that plan was shelved due to vociferous protests from students. Her plans to build a brand-new complex in Kotturpuram and an administrative city in Mamallapuram were also shelved.

Source: Deccan Herald