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The Prime Minister’s Office (PMO) has shifted to its new abode, named ‘Seva Tirth’. It is said that shifting from the colonial-era South Bloc will lead to a mindset change in government – from imperial to a “new” model of governance where “citizens will be at the centre of decision-making”. The Prime Minister, inaugurating the new building, said, “The decisions made here [in the new premises] will serve as the foundation for advancing the ambitions of 140 crore citizens rather than reflecting the will of a monarch.”

Can a change of buildings change the mindset of the rulers? Will they suddenly become responsive to 140 crore Indians? Since they operated from the same colonial buildings being decried now, were they also not responsive to the people since 2014? Is that the government’s justification for implementing a faulty Goods and Services Tax (GST), the disastrous demonetisation and the sudden lockdown that adversely impacted people? To admit this would undermine the ruling party’s refrain that India did not gain freedom in 1947 but in 2014 – when Narendra Modi became Prime Minister.

One may then ask, how was the Constitution of India drafted and adopted in these colonial-era buildings? And is it not this foundational document that enabled the ruling party to come to power? While India has lagged behind other countries in development, it has developed considerably in the last 79 years. Did the colonial-era buildings now come in the way of those advances?

Do buildings determine the thinking of people who work in them? Is it not too deterministic an........

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