The Rs-271 cr project is underway inside the Nehru Memorial premises.Two mid-sized amaltas trees, that became a bone of contention ahead of the building of the Prime Ministers’ Museum inside the Nehru Memorial premises, will now be retained. The administration of the Nehru Memorial Museum & Library (NMML), which is overseeing the Rs-271 crore PMs’ Museum project, has now altered the site plan for the new museum to accommodate the trees.
Shakti Sinha, Director, NMML, told The Indian Express, “We realised the two small trees were falling inside the new museum’s periphery, and had to be cut to execute the site plan drawn by architects. We asked Sikka Associates to rework the plan in a way that no trees had to be cut. They have submitted the new plan, and work is going on according to it.”
The administration admitted that cutting the trees would have led to more controversy in the already-embroiled project, as it requires tree-cutting permission from the environment ministry, thus hampering construction. Sinha added they want to complete construction by the end of the year, and the museum should be functional by mid-2020.
However, a staffer from the horticulture section at NMML said, “They didn’t want to court more controversy, since many of us know these trees were planted by Rajiv Gandhi and Sanjay Gandhi as young boys, when their grandfather (Jawaharlal Nehru) lived here as India’s first Prime Minister.” Sinha denied knowledge of the fact, saying, “Had that been so, signboards would have been placed in front of those trees.”
Late last year, the Centre decided to go ahead with its plan to build the museum, even as former Prime Minister Manmohan Singh had written to PM Narendra Modi, urging him to leave the complex “undisturbed”.
Congress leaders Mallikarjun Kharge and Jairam Ramesh, who are members of the NMML Society, also strongly objected to the museum’s construction. Activists also raised their voice against the felling of trees in the premises to accommodate the new building.
