Shift to Seva Teerth, A Quiet Historical Correction
As the Prime Minister’s Office Moves from Colonial Edifices to New Governance Complexes, India Sheds the Last Visible Symbols of Imperial Hierarchy
Some changes do not arrive with thunder. They arrive quietly and yet alter the meaning of a state. As a student in the late 1980s, while browsing in the library of IIT Kanpur, I recall reading an article by M.V. Kamath in The Illustrated Weekly of India describing how Mahatma Gandhi spent August 15, 1947, not in Delhi’s corridors of power, but in Noakhali, walking among riot-affected villagers. In the same article, Kamath was sharply critical of freedom fighters and wrote something to the effect that while the Mahatma was touring Noakhali, our freedom fighters were busy converting Viceroy’s House into Rashtrapati Bhavan.
That image has stayed with me for decades: the Father of the Nation, in the moment of independence, choosing to be with the suffering rather than with the powerful. It encapsulates a profound truth about India’s moral compass—a truth that has often been obscured by the architecture of governance inherited from our colonial past.
In many ways, the Narendra Modi government’s move to shift the North and South Block offices is a historical correction, a shedding of the colonial mindset. The move has brought back the thoughts I had as a student and got me wondering why it was not done years ago. The structures on Raisina Hill were conceived by Edwin Lutyens and Herbert Baker after the capital was shifted from Kolkata to Delhi. Monumental and axial, they were designed to communicate permanence and distance. The imposing North and South blocks were conceived as symbols of imperial power, meant to dominate visually and psychologically.
The Architecture of Empire
Independent India inherited these edifices. While the Tricolour replaced the Union Jack and the spirit of governance transformed, the language of elevation endured in the architecture. The republic assumed authority within grand imperial buildings, even as its moral centre often stood beside the vulnerable.
For generations of prime ministers, ministers, bureaucrats, and government officers, those spaces symbolised arrival, responsibility, and entry into the highest circles of governance. To leave such architecture is, for many, akin to relinquishing something prized. The high ceilings, the sprawling corridors, the sense of occupying spaces once walked by viceroys—these things matter psychologically. They confer a sense of importance, of being part of a continuum of power.
Yet this moment invites a more searching question: Were we elevated by the building, or was the building elevated by the work done within it? The answer is not as obvious as it might seem. Buildings are inert; they acquire meaning from the actions that occur within them. A building that housed imperial oppression can, through the work of democratic governance, be transformed into something noble. But the reverse is also true: even the most beautifully conceived architecture cannot make good governance happen.
The relocation of the Prime Minister’s Office to Seva Teerth and other offices to Kartavya Bhavan may, at first glance, appear procedural. Yet it represents something deeper: a shift in the relationship between the state and the people. This is not merely about moving furniture and files; it is about reimagining what governance means and how it should be experienced by citizens.
Citizen-Centric Governance
Citizen-centric governance should not be merely a rhetorical flourish; it needs to be an operational discipline. It requires getting rid of the Raj-style clerical mindset as well. The colonial administration was designed to extract resources and maintain order, not to serve citizens. Its procedures were opaque, its hierarchies rigid, its culture one of distance and deference.
Independent India has struggled to overcome this inheritance. Despite seven decades of democracy, the interface between citizen and state often remains intimidating. Government offices are places where ordinary people feel small, where they wait for hours, where they are shunted from desk to desk. The physical spaces reinforce this experience—the high counters, the long corridors, the closed doors.
The new governance complexes are built with modern technology and spatial configurations that enable collaboration rather than hierarchy. They are designed to be accessible, to reduce the psychological distance between those who govern and those who are governed. The lack of elevated architecture plays a role in ensuring that citizens find government offices accessible and non-imposing. When a citizen walks into a government building, they should feel that they belong there, that the building exists to serve them, not to intimidate them.
This shift requires integration across departments, clarity in outcomes, and speed in decision-making and execution. Physical space matters because it shapes institutional mindset and working ethos. An open-plan office encourages collaboration; a labyrinth of closed offices encourages silos. A building that is accessible invites engagement; one that is imposing discourages it.
The Symbolic Dimension
The transition is not merely symbolic; it is also infrastructural. But the symbolic dimension should not be underestimated. Symbols matter in politics. They shape how citizens perceive the state and how officials perceive themselves. When the Prime Minister works from a building called “Seva Teerth”—a place of pilgrimage for service—it sends a message about what governance should mean.
This message is reinforced by the naming of other complexes. “Kartavya Bhavan”—the House of Duty—reminds those who work there that their role is not to wield power but to perform duty. The shift from “Block” to “Bhavan” is more than linguistic; it reflects a different conception of the relationship between state and society.
Of course, this transition does not and should not erase history. South Block and North Block will remain part of India’s rich historical heritage, reminders of a complex journey through colonialism, the sacrifices of our freedom fighters, independence, and democratic consolidation. Their conversion into museums will allow younger generations to understand our long history and the struggles of our forefathers.
This is the right approach. History should be preserved and studied, not obliterated. The buildings that housed the colonial administration have stories to tell—stories of oppression, of resistance, of transformation. Turning them into museums ensures that those stories continue to be told, that the past is not forgotten even as the nation moves forward.
Authority Has Moved
But authority has moved, and that movement carries an important civilisational meaning. The physical relocation of the seat of power is a declaration that India has fully shed its colonial inheritance. It is a statement that the architecture of governance should reflect the values of the republic, not the values of the empire.
In many ways, it signals the maturity of a nation that aligns physical governance infrastructure with its moral philosophy. It rearticulates what Bharat as a nation-state stands for. It is a historical shift whose deeper importance will unfold in the history written for a modern, Viksit Bharat.
This is not the first such shift in Indian history. When the capital was moved from Calcutta to Delhi in 1911, it was a statement of imperial intent—a desire to establish a permanent and visible seat of power. When independent India chose to remain in those buildings, it was a statement of continuity—a recognition that the institutions of governance could be repurposed even if their architecture could not be immediately replaced.
Now comes the next step: the conscious choice to build new spaces that reflect new values. This is not a rejection of the past but an evolution from it. It acknowledges that while the buildings of Lutyens’ Delhi have served the republic well, they were not designed for it. They were designed for something else, and that something else leaves its imprint on all who work within them.
The Moral Centre
Kamath’s critique of the freedom fighters who flocked to Viceroy’s House while Gandhi walked in Noakhali was perhaps too harsh. The work of governance had to begin somewhere, and the buildings of Delhi were where it could happen. But the contrast he drew remains powerful: the moral centre of the nation was not in the corridors of power but among the suffering.
The shift to Seva Teerth and Kartavya Bhavan cannot, by itself, move the moral centre of governance. That depends on the people who work there and the decisions they make. But it can create conditions in which service and duty are more easily remembered. It can remove the psychological distance that imperial architecture created. It can remind those who govern that they are not rulers but servants.
This is the deeper meaning of the change. It is not about buildings; it is about what buildings represent. It is about the kind of nation India aspires to be—a nation where power is not about elevation but about service, where governance is not about distance but about accessibility, where the state exists for the citizen, not the citizen for the state.
Q&A: Unpacking the Shift from North and South Blocks
Q1: What is the historical significance of the North and South Blocks?
A: The North and South Blocks on Raisina Hill were conceived by Edwin Lutyens and Herbert Baker after the British capital was shifted from Kolkata to Delhi. They were designed as monumental, axial structures to communicate imperial power, permanence, and distance—dominating both visually and psychologically. After independence, India inherited these edifices, and they housed the Prime Minister’s Office and key ministries, symbolising entry into the highest circles of governance, even though their architecture reflected colonial rather than democratic values.
Q2: What does the move to Seva Teerth and Kartavya Bhavan represent?
A: The relocation represents a historical correction—a shedding of the colonial mindset embedded in imperial architecture. The new complexes are built with modern technology and spatial configurations that enable collaboration rather than hierarchy. The names themselves are significant: “Seva Teerth” (a place of pilgrimage for service) and “Kartavya Bhavan” (House of Duty) reflect a shift in the relationship between the state and the people, emphasising citizen-centric governance over imperial-style authority.
Q3: Why does physical space matter for governance?
A: Physical space shapes institutional mindset and working ethos. The imposing, hierarchical architecture of the colonial era reinforced distance between rulers and ruled. The new complexes are designed to be accessible and non-imposing, encouraging integration across departments, clarity in outcomes, and speed in decision-making. When citizens walk into government buildings, they should feel they belong there, not that they are supplicants before power. The lack of elevated architecture plays a role in ensuring accessibility.
Q4: What will happen to the old North and South Blocks?
A: The old buildings will remain part of India’s historical heritage, reminders of the complex journey through colonialism, freedom struggle, independence, and democratic consolidation. Their conversion into museums will allow younger generations to understand this history and the struggles of forefathers. This approach preserves history while allowing governance to evolve—acknowledging the past without being bound by it.
Q5: What deeper meaning does the author find in this transition?
A: The author sees this as signalling the maturity of a nation that aligns its physical governance infrastructure with its moral philosophy. It rearticulates what Bharat as a nation-state stands for—service over power, duty over privilege, accessibility over distance. While buildings alone cannot transform governance, they can create conditions in which service and duty are more easily remembered. The move removes the psychological distance imperial architecture created and reminds those who govern that they are not rulers but servants of the people.
