India’s Supreme Court has asked the Union government to put its plan for the 135-year-old Central Secretariat Library on the record, after concern that the Central Vista redevelopment could leave one of the country’s largest government libraries without adequate space.
Justices Sanjay Kumar and Sanjeev Sachdeva issued notice in a case the court opened on its own initiative. The government must file an affidavit identifying the area to be allotted to the library and provide the actual layout plan. The matter is due to return on Oct. 16.
The library holds more than 850,000 books and has operated from four floors of Shastri Bhawan since 1969. Reports that prompted the proceeding said the redevelopment plan had provided only two rooms in Kartavya Bhawan-2. The Housing and Urban Affairs Ministry has said space has been allocated, but the court wants dimensions and drawings rather than a general assurance.
The order is preliminary. It does not decide that the government has failed a legal duty, nor does it halt demolition or relocation work. It turns a question of administrative planning into a matter requiring sworn evidence and judicial review.
The case also raises a less familiar issue in the Central Vista litigation: what happens to a public institution whose value lies not in a single protected building but in a collection, cataloguing system and working space accumulated over generations. A nominal allocation would not answer whether the books can be stored, conserved and made accessible.
By requiring an affidavit and layout, the court has narrowed the next hearing to facts capable of verification. The government will have to show where the collection is meant to go, how much space it will receive and whether the plan can support the library’s continuing public function.
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