Delhi Metro Underground Digging Destroyed This 113 Year Old National Cadet Corps Building

Delhi Metro's heritage line seems to have chipped away a slice of history. The underground tunnelling work for the Central Secretariat-Kashmere Gate line has led to the partial collapse of a 113-year-old heritage building in Kashmere Gate, within the complex that houses the Ambedkar University.

Part of the colonial-era structure, one of the most architecturally important buildings in the area, collapsed late last month after Metro's tunnelling work below the building had weakened the foundation, experts said. The complex has other historically important structures such as the Dara Shikoh Library. Delhi Metro has pledged to reconstruct the collapsed portions of the building, built in 1902. An area resident said it came down in a huge cloud of dust one evening. No one was hurt.

The building that collapsed due to Delhi Metro's tunnelling work currently offices and rooms of the National Cadet Corps and is maintained by the Public Works Department today. "It was around 5pm in the evening and fortunately, no one was around when the structure started making some noise. Before we could realize what had happened, the building just started coming down in a huge cloud of dust,'' said a local resident.

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Till 1998, the building was the campus of the Netaji Subhas Institute of Technology (formerly, Delhi Institute of Technology). "The tunneling work below the building was too much of a strain on the structure. Portions of the block are still standing and we are watching it closely to ensure there are no new cracks,'' said a PWD official. The building had architectural features such as a circular projection in the centre, semi-circular arches and sandstone columns with floral motifs, similar to those seen in other British-era buildings on the capus. They were built with quartzite stone with a sandstone floor, typical of colonial architecture of that time.

For 15 years, the building housed the then Delhi Institute of Technology, till the college, now known as NSIT, moved to a larger campus in Dwarka. Graded B in terms of architectural value by INTACH in their heritage listing, the building is widely recognized as one of the most architecturally unique structures of the colonial era still standing in Kashmere Gate. The first floor of the collapsed structure served as storage rooms for NCC cadets while the ground floor houses offices and restrooms. The entire damage is still to be ascertained.

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Delhi Metro's tunneling work has been taking place 15 metres below the campus. "We have had no issues with the tunneling so far. In this case, the sewer line between the surface machine and the TBM started leaking. This caused the soil to weaken and we think that the vibrations reached the building. It is an old structure and this could have led to the partial collapse,'' said Delhi Metro spokesperson Anuj Dayal.

DMRC officials said they immediately evacuated the building and are ensuring that no further damage takes place. "The building is close to the main road and we are taking every precaution. We have installed gadgets to measure vibrations when the second tunneling goes through. The whole area will be propped up and additional support be provided to the building so that there vibrations do not affect the structures," Dayal said. "Once the tunnelling work is complete, we will reconstruct the collapsed portions as per the original architecture," he added.

Architects and heritage experts have slammed Delhi Metro, saying that the collapse only confirmed their fears about the tunneling work affecting archaeologically rich zones. Metro was in a rush to meet deadlines and did not adhere to safety norms, they alleged.

"At the minimum, Delhi Metro should have preceded tunnelling work with structural assessments of buildings ¡ª heritage or modern ¡ª and conducted a detailed soil analysis. It is fortunate that no lives were lost and that the structure is not of equivalent heritage value as some of the 16th century structures the Metro is passing under,'' said conservation architect Ratish Nanda. Senior INTACH officials were worried over the impact of tunnelling in other historic buildings of the area. Metro, however, called the incident a rare exception. "We exercise extreme caution in archaeological zones. This was an unexpected incident as we did not anticipate that the sewer line would leak,'' said Dayal.

(Originally published in the Times of India)