On the auspicious occasion of Makar Sankranti on January 15, Sonia Gandhi will inaugurate Indira Bhawan, the new headquarters of the All India Congress Committee (AICC), in her capacity as the Congress Party (CPP) president. The event was originally scheduled for the party’s National Day on December 28, but was delayed due to the death of Dr Manmohan Singh and the subsequent national mourning.
The two-acre site on which the new office will be located is surrounded by Deen Dayal Upadhyay Marg and Kotla Marg. To avoid mentioning the name of Upadhyay, a Jan Sangh stalwart and Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) icon, the Congress will set up a main gate at Kotla Marg, virtually at the rear of the premises, in its speech. I chose that. As a result, 9A Kotla Marg will be the new address of Parliament.
Originally known as Rouse Avenue (named after Sir Alexander MacDonald Rouse, the supervising engineer who oversaw the New Delhi project a century ago), the road was founded by the founder of the Bharatiya Janata Party, who founded the party in 1953. It was renamed in 1970 after General Secretary Jean Sangh. The Jan Sangh won the 1967 Delhi municipal elections and a government led by Vijay Kumar Malhotra was formed. They renamed the road and installed a statue of Upadhyay in the park that now faces the Bharatiya Janata Party’s swanky headquarters at 6A, Deen Dayal Upadhyay Marg.
Entrance from the back door
This is the second time Congress has chosen backdoor admission. Located on Dr. Rajendra Prasad Road and home to the Rajiv Gandhi Foundation, Jawahar Bhavan is located on the premises whose original address was 3 Raisina Road. The building was initially constructed as the AICC office but was handed over to the foundation after the tragic assassination of Rajiv Gandhi in 1991. The site was located opposite 6 Raisina Road and was occupied by opposition strongman Atal Bihari Vajpayee at the time. Congressional leadership therefore opted for a back entrance to the site.
Political parties and organizations are allotted office space in the Rouse Avenue area. The Gandhi Peace Foundation, where Jayaprakash Narayan made Morarji Desai the Janata Prime Minister in 1977, is located on this street. Other offices here include those of Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) and Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (DMK). Rouse Avenue is also the location of the special court where cases involving VVIPs filed by the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) and the Enforcement Directorate (ED) are decided.
The Communist Party of India (CPI) established its Ajoy Bhawan headquarters at 15 Kotla Marg in 1972. The office, named after Ajoy Ghose, general secretary of the undivided CPI, faces the site of the original Delhi Central Jail. Moved to Tihar in 1957. An adjacent bungalow was used to imprison Sheikh Mohammad in the 1950s. Abdullah from Jammu and Kashmir. The CPI was India’s main opposition party until 1967, but its dominance waned when it moved to Kotla Marg in the 1970s. Currently, each CPI has two members of parliament;
The beginning with Anand Bhavan
The history of the Indian National Congress Headquarters, which will celebrate its 140th anniversary in December 2025, begins in 1930 when Motilal Nehru built Anand Bhawan in Allahabad (now Prayagraj). His former home, adjacent to Anand Bhawan and later renamed Swaraj Bhawan, was dedicated to the state and became the AICC office.
In 1931, the Swaraj Bhawan’s Congress Working Committee (CWC) included four members of the Nehru family: Motilal Nehru, Jawaharlal Nehru, Kamla Nehru, and Motilal’s son-in-law. One Ranjit Sitaram Pandit (husband of Vijay Lakshmi Pandit, sister of Jawaharlal). Sonia Gandhi, Rahul Gandhi and Priyanka Gandhi Vadra will be part of the CWC once the party moves to Indira Bhawan in 2025.
The AICC office moved to New Delhi in 1947, just before independence. The CWC deliberated on the Partition Plan on June 15, 1947 at its new office at 7 Jantar Mantar Road. This office was used extensively by Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru for party activities. When Indira Gandhi became Congress president in 1959, 7 Jantar Mantar Road became her office.
History of address relocation
When the Indian Congress split in 1969 and Indira Gandhi’s supporters commandeered a meeting of the All India Congress Committee (AICC), the official party led by S. Nijalingappa was called the Congress (organisation) and the Jantar Man Retained control of 7 Tull Street. With the merger of the Congress (O) into the Janata Party in 1977, the Janata Party headquarters came to be located at these premises. After a series of splits in the Janata movement, the office’s current tenants include the Janata Dal (United) (JD-U) as well as commercial organizations such as Rentokil Pest Control and Antim Yatra Funeral Services. are. As per the 1993 notification, the ownership of No. 7 Jantar Mantar Road now lies with the Central Government.
After the 1969 split, the Indira Gandhi faction of the Congress held a meeting at Mabulankar Hall, chaired by Jagjivan Ram. In 1971, the Election Commission recognized this party, which had received overwhelming support in opinion polls, as the Congress (Jajivan). Two bungalows (numbers 3 and 5) on nearby Raisina Road were used for ancillary events during the 1969 session. These two bungalows later became part of the AICC establishment, but the party headquarters remained at 21 Windsor Place.
The AICC then moved to 5 Rajendra Prasad Street, where Morarji Desai served as Deputy Prime Minister until 1969, when he resigned from Indira’s government after the partition. 5 Rajendra Prasad Road saw both the triumphant victory of the 1971 polls and the dark days of the Emergency. During this period, Dr Shankar Dayal Sharma and DK Barooah presided over the party.
1978 split
In January 1978, the Congress faced further splits and Indira Gandhi’s party moved to its current premises at 24 Akbar Street, adjacent to 10 Janpath. The bungalow, now Sonia Gandhi’s residence, was used as the office of the Indian Youth Congress during Sanjay Gandhi’s tenure as president of Ambika Soni, the most powerful member of the National Council.
The history of the 1978 split is interesting. In ruling on the split, Election Commissioner SL Shakda recognized the faction led by Indira Gandhi as a “true parliament” with the right to function under the name and style of the Indian National Congress. Shakder noted that other factions have seen many departures and entries. For example, K. Brahmananda Reddy, who was elected Congress President in May 1977 and led the party from which Indira Gandhi revolted in 1978, later joined the Congress (I). Devraj Urs, one of Indira Gandhi’s aides in 1978, was leading the opposition at the time of the verdict. The lawyer who initially represented the “other parliament” in the case, VM Syed Mohammed, belonged to Indira’s party and had been appointed high commissioner in London.
Shahdar forbade the ‘another parliament’ from taking on the style of the Indian National Congress and gave it the name Indian Congress (Socialist). Sharad Pawar then led the party, which merged with the main Nationalist Congress faction at a rally in Nagpur in December 1985. The merger saw 3 Raisina Road, the Congress (S)’s stronghold, handed over to the parent party.
Jawahar Bhawan, located on the original 3 Raisina Road site, housed the AICC extension office till May 1991. Among its occupiers was Pranab Mukherjee, who headed the party’s public relations and other departments during the 1991 elections. Jitendra Prasada, political secretary to then Congress president Rajiv Gandhi, also used the premises.
Finally, AICC has its own facility in New Delhi. The foundation stone of Indira Bhawan was laid by Sonia Gandhi as Congress president on the occasion of the party’s 125th anniversary in December 2009. This project took 15 years to come to fruition. Construction work on the BJP national headquarters at nearby Deen Dayal Upadhyay Marg 6A began in August 2016 and was completed in 18 months, with an inauguration ceremony held in February 2018.
(Mr. Shuvabrata Bhattacharya is a former editor and public relations critic)
Disclaimer: These are the author’s personal opinions.
