Old Parl building to turn a museum of historical decisions

NEW DELHI: The old Parliament building, an architectural splendour and a historic landmark that guided the destiny of India for nearly a century and whose illustrious legacy will now be consigned to the pages of history, was inaugurated on January 18, 1927 by the then Viceroy Lord Irwin.

On May 28, when Prime Minister Narendra Modi will inaugurate the new Parliament building and dedicate it to the nation, the old Sansad Bhavan will also hand over its position as the country’s hallowed legislature, a privilege it enjoyed for over 96 years.

Revered today as India’s temple of democracy, the old Parliament House has for these nine-and-a-half decades witnessed the imperial rule of the

British and its chamber has heard the echoes of bombs hurled by revolutionaries Bhagat Singh and Batukeshwar Dutt in a bid to attain freedom. The building has seen the dawn of Independence and its halls have reverberated with the historic ‘Tryst with Destiny’ speech delivered by first prime minister Jawaharlal Nehru on August 15, 1947.

An architectural marvel with its charming circular design and an impressive colonnade of 144 creamy sandstone on the first floor, the old building was opened amid much fanfare at a time when the new imperial capital of the British Raj - New Delhi - was being built at a site in Raisina Hill area.

A grand ceremony was held on January 18, 1927 to mark the opening of the majestic building, then called as the Council House. Over a century ago, when the nation was still in the making and Independence 26 years away, Britain’s Duke of Connaught had laid the foundation stone of Parliament House on February 12, 1921, and said it would stand “as the symbol of India’s rebirth to yet higher destinies”.

The building, with a diameter of 560 ft and circumference of one-third of a mile, was designed by Sir Herbert Baker, who along with Sir Edwin Lutyens was chosen to design the new imperial capital in Delhi.

According to the book “New Delhi - Making of a Capital”, Lord Irwin had arrived in his viceregal carriage at a pavilion set up at the Great Place, and then “proceeded to open the door of the Council House with a golden key, handed to him by Sir Herbert Baker”.

The sprawling edifice covering an area of nearly six acres and its creamy sandstone colonnade, is one of the most distinctive parliament buildings anywhere in the world, and one of the most defining and widely-recognised structures.

The opening of the Parliament House building was much talked about then in both domestic and foreign press, as the new building, built in its vicinity, is being talked about in media now, ahead of its inauguration.