Kolkata, 8 May

Senior BJP leader Suvendu Adhikari was on Friday elected the leader of the BJP legislature party in West Bengal, paving the way for him to become the first BJP chief minister of the state.

BJP sources said Adhikari's name was proposed at the legislature party meeting here and formally announced by Union Home MinisterAmit Shah in the presence of newly elected BJP MLAs and senior party leaders.

The swearing-in ceremony of the new BJP government will be held at the Brigade Parade Ground in Kolkata on 9 May.

Meanwhile, work is going on in full swing at the West Bengal Assembly to make arrangements for a possible cabinet meeting after the swearing-in ceremony of the new government on Saturday, a senior official said.

In the absence of any official communication, the Assembly secretariat is preparing the premises amid the possibility that the new cabinet members may come there after the swearing-in and hold their first meeting chaired by the new chief minister, the official told PTI. The Writers’ Buildings, which is set to house the Chief Minister’s Office (CMO) and several key departments, is undergoing renovation and maintenance.

The building ceased to function as the state secretariat in 2013 after Mamata Banerjee shifted the secretariat to Nabanna.

Asked whether the CMO would temporarily function from the Assembly annex building before the renovation work at Writers’ Buildings is completed, the official said, "No such word has been communicated to us. I think the final decision will be announced by the BJP leadership by tomorrow morning."

The Assembly annex building was inaugurated a few years ago.

Meanwhile, nameplates of all ministers outside their rooms in the Assembly, located across the lobbies of the old Assembly building, were removed as cleaning and maintenance work gathered pace. Chief Secretary Dushmanta Narial held an emergency meeting with Assembly personnel on May 6, the official said.

"We have been asked to keep the annex building ready and take into account every infrastructural issue, considering security and other aspects. The building has to be kept ready," he said.

The foundation stone of the West Bengal Legislative Assembly building was laid on 9 July, 1928, and the structure was completed in two years and seven months, blending oriental and occidental architectural influences. The first sitting of the newly constituted Assembly was held on 7 April, 1937.

The Mamata Banerjee-led Trinamool Congress came to power in the state in 2011, and the CMO was in the Writers' Buildings for two years before moving to 'Nabanna', a 14-storey structure at Shibpur in Howrah. Nabanna was built for a project of the Hooghly River Bridge Commissioners.

Before 2013, the Writer's Building used to be the state secretariat housing the CMO and most other important government offices. Built in 1780, the three-storey red Writers’ Buildings follows the neoclassical style with Corinthian columns.

Constructed by builder Thomas Lyon, the structure initially served as a boarding house for junior-level clerks known as “writers”, from which the building derived its name. It was later converted into an administrative office by Warren Hastings.

After Independence, it became the seat of power of the West Bengal government. From the first chief minister, Prafulla Chandra Ghosh of the Congress, in 1947 to CPI(M)’s Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee in 2011, all chief ministers operated from the building until Mamata Banerjee shifted the secretariat to Nabanna.

"The move to shift the state secretariat to Nabanna was a hasty, poor planned one with no thought given to heritage and history. We will change that," BJP MLA-elect Agnimitra Paul said.