The Bharatiya Janta Party will soon get a new address. The new headquarters of India’s ruling party is a swanky five-storied building on Deen Dayal Upadhyay Marg which is expected to be inaugurated within a month or two.
The building with parking facility in the basement and modern facilities has been built in a record time of about one and a half years.
“The constriction is 99% complete,” a BJP leader said. The only work pending now was installation of TV sets, laying of telephone lines and a few others similar works, he added. The party has not finalised dates of the inauguration, but another leader said it will be a grand event attended by thousands of leaders and workers from across the country.
The office, located adjacent to the Ranjit Singh flyover that connects central and old Delhi, will have separate chambers for party’s national office bearers, a huge convention hall, a rich library, video conferencing facilities and media rooms for spokespersons. Entry to some parts of this building, such as digital operations, will be restricted.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi had laid the foundation stone for the new office on August 18, 2016. This was a year and half after the ministry of urban development’s land screening panel cleared the allotment of the plot to the BJP on February 26, 2015.
{{/usCountry}}Prime Minister Narendra Modi had laid the foundation stone for the new office on August 18, 2016. This was a year and half after the ministry of urban development’s land screening panel cleared the allotment of the plot to the BJP on February 26, 2015.
{{/usCountry}}The BJP’s applications to the Union urban development ministry for a plot of land got stuck twice – once in 2002 and then in 2006. The application was finally approved only in 2015 after the BJP came to power at the centre.
A party’s strength in Parliament decides the size of the land it is entitled to. A party with 101 to 200 members in both the Houses is entitled to two acres. More than 200 members of Parliament allow a party four acres, according to the allotment rules framed for political parties in 2006 by the UPA government. The rules, however, are silent on what happens when a party’s tally takes a hit.
Before it swept to power in May, the BJP, headquartered at 11 Ashoka Road, was eligible to two acres for its national office. With a combined strength of 327 MPs then -- 281 in the Lok Sabha and 46 in the Rajya Sabha -– the party quickly claimed a larger share.
The party’s Delhi unit, which functions from 14 Pandit Pant Marg, too, was given an 809-sq metre plot in Pocket 5 of the DDU Marg in December. A separate set of rules govern allotment of land to state units.