Council hall meetings to be shifted out of Ripon Building for first time in 9 decades

Chennai: For the first time in nine decades, the Chennai Corporation council meetings are to be held outside the heritage Ripon Building. The civic body is contemplating conducting the meetings at the under construction green building inside Ripon’s premises. The Ripon Building has been hosting the council meetings since 1930s.

According to Chennai Corporation sources, the present Council hall on the second floor of the Ripon Building is insufficient to provide comfortable seatings for the elected councillors. “The decision has been taken on moving the council meetings to the much spacious green building. Minor modifications will be done for the hall. Construction works will be completed before the end of 2023,” a source said.

Several councillors, during the 2011-2016 regime, had demanded that the civic administration take measures to expand the council hall but the civic body could not modify the heritage building. Prior to 2011, there were only 155 councillors but the number went up to 200 in 2011.

The civic body cleaned up the Council hall a few weeks ago for the swearing-in ceremony of councillors after a gap of six years. At present, Ripon Building houses the chambers of the Mayor, Deputy Mayor, Commissioner and deputy commissioners along with standing committee offices. Most of the engineering departments are functioning from the Amma Maaligai.

The civic body is constructing a green building in compliance with the IGBC Green New Building Platinum rating, GRIHA 5 Star rating and LEED Platinum rating to house integrated command and control centre (ICCC). As per the proposal, the building will minimise the usage of air-conditioning to save electricity.

The ground-plus-four-floor building will house a digital experience centre, smart governance centre and disaster response centre apart from the council hall and the ICCC. Meanwhile, the civic body has already commenced works to construct an interlink bridge connecting Amma Maaligai, Revenue building, Green Building and Ripon Building. The interlink bridge will make moving between various buildings in the premises easy.