HP: Bantony Castle Estate, heritage building to be turned into

The Himachal Pradesh Cabinet today decided to acquire the sprawlingBantony Castle Estate close to Mall Road here along with the heritage building for developing a museum.

The total area to be acquired fro the project is 19436.83 sq mts and the cabinet has approved paymentof Rs 27.84 crore to the owners, an official release said.

Earlier the government had proposed to acquire part ofthe estate measuring 3874.39 sq mts for the project but the owners did not agree as the remaining piece of land would be left of no value once themain part is acquired, it said.

Moreover, the land except the building and the lawn, which housed the police headquarters till a few years ago is forest area with hundreds of full frown pine trees, the release said.
 

Once the summer palace of the erstwhile Maharaja of Sirmaur, Sir Amar Prakash Bahadurlent this estate to the British and it was used as the office of military works.

While heritage building belonged to Captain A Gordon and ithoused some army officers.

Before its construction in 1880 the site had asmall cottage. The Maharaja of Sirmaur built the estate's eclectic part in mock-Tudor and part chalet, and crowned it with sloping roofs with mini-towers.

Since 1957 the castle building, now in an advanced state of decay, had been the headquartersof state police and was vacated about eight years ago after a court case and it housed the Employment Exchange for a very long time.

Proceedings to acquire the Bantony Estate were initiated twice earlier, in 1968 for construction of government residential buildings and again in 1975, for a mini-secretariat. Both the acquisition were not completed, it said.

The release said in 2004, the government started proceduresof negotiations with the owners but nothing could be finalised.

However, in 2013 the governmentto acquire 3874.39 sq mts of Bantony Estate issued a notification under section 4 of Land AcquisitionAct of 1894, it said.

But the government was informed by the District Collector that the Land AcquisitionAct of 1894 had been repealed by the Right to Fair Compensation andTransparency in Land Acquisition, Rehabilitation and Resettlement (RFCTLARR) Act, 2013, the release said.

It said that in pursuance of RFCTLARR Act, 2013, the Himachal Pradesh government framed rules for the Himachal Pradesh Right to Fair Compensation and Transparency in Land Acquisition, Rehabilitationand Resettlement (Social Impact Assessment Consent) Rules, 2015.

Finally, thestate government through the Department of Language, Art and Culture issued a notification on June 1 last year proposing 3874.39 sq meters land of Bantony Castle will be acquired for a museum, the release said.