Rashtrapati Bhavan becomes new venue for chief ministerial conclaves

PM Modi wants such meetings with CMs to take place around the proverbial 'round table'

The Rashtrapati Bhavan auditorium is increasingly replacing Vigyan Bhavan as the address for meetings attended by chief ministers of states.

On Sunday, the auditorium will be the venue for the Governing Council meeting of the NITI Aayog. In a first, the auditorium was the venue for the Inter-State Council meeting in July last year.

The NITI Aayog Governing Council, which comprises all chief ministers and some senior cabinet ministers, is expected to deliberate on the vision of ‘new India’ for the next three years and also on a wider 15-year timeframe.

The chief ministers of all 29 states and two union territories that have legislative assemblies — Delhi and Puducherry — have been invited. 

However, some sources said West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee and Kerala Chief Minister P Vijayan haven’t given a final confirmation of attending the Sunday’s meet, though there hasn’t been any official response on the same.

In the earlier Planning Commission, most such meetings between the Prime Minister and state Chief Ministers and also of the Inter-State Council took place at Vigyan Bhavan, the preeminent convention centre in New Delhi for central government events.  

The first and second Governing Council meetings of the newly formed NITI Aayog was held in 7 Race Course Road, the official residence of the Prime Minister.

Sources say the PM believes that in the spirit of “cooperative federalism” the venue for such meetings between him and chief ministers should take place around the proverbial ‘round table’, with the symbolism that everybody who sits there has equal status. 

In contrast, the main conference hall at Vigyan Bhavan had the PM and senior cabinet ministers seated on the dais, while chief ministers and officials comprised the audience. Modi had attended several of these conferences in Vigyan Bhavan as chief minister of Gujarat from 2001 to May 2014.

Officials said that Modi preferred the Rashtrapati Bhavan auditorium because the venue enabled a free exchange of ideas among participants. 

The venue is deep inside the President’s Estate and doesn’t disrupt normal traffic. 

In another unintended outcome, media crews have to wait at some distance from the venue. In Vigyan Bhavan, media crews wait metres from the spot where invitees get off their vehicles.

The Rashtrapati Bhavan auditorium was constructed at the initiative of APJ Abdul Kalam when he was President and completed in 2007. 

In the last few years, the venue has hosted the Digidhan Award Ceremony of the NITI Aayog. 

The auditorium is also the venue for the annual ‘At Home’ events hosted by the President, which were earlier hosted in the open but ran the risk of being disrupted by rain.