NEW DELHI: South Block, home to all major decisions in govt for over five decades, will see the prime minister’s office (PMO) move out of the British-era building on Friday afternoon and shift to the newly constructed Seva Teerth.PM Narendra Modi will chair the last Cabinet meeting in South Block scheduled on that day before the inauguration of the new administrative building, which is less than a kilometre from the iconic structure on Raisina Hill.TOI has learnt that after the Cabinet meeting, Union ministers and top bureaucrats will go from South Block to Sewa Teerth, which houses the new PMO, cabinet secretariat, office of National Security Adviser and India House, the new venue to host high-level delegations. Officials said the first Cabinet meeting under PM Jawaharlal Nehru was held in South Block.Cabinet secretariat has already shifted from Rashtrapati Bhawan to Seva Teerth-2 and the shifting of NSA’s office from Sardar Patel Bhawan to Seva Teerth-3 in the new executive enclave is underway.South Block and North Block on Raisina Hill were built in 1931. The history of PMO traces to a small PM’s secretariat (PMS) in 1947 to provide basic administrative help to the PM. The first major structural change happened in 1964 after Lal Bahadur Shastri became PM when PMS got statutory status via Allocation of Business Rules. The authority of the office increased significantly during Indira Gandhi’s tenure and in 1977 it was renamed PMO during Morarji Desai’s tenure.PMO’s shift will be followed by the ministries of defence and external affairs from South Block to multiple offices over the next few weeks. The movement to the new complex means the country’s power centre is completely moving out of Raisina Hill. North Block has been vacated completely with ministries moving out of the iconic building to new buildings along Kartavya Path, which was earlier called Raj Path.
