New Indian parliament built by Tata Group conglomerate costs about 12 billion rupees

This article is more than one year old.
Published on April 21, 2023 at 04:00
2 min read
By Anuradha PRASAD, AFP India

Social media users in India have repeatedly shared a false claim that the Tata Group conglomerate charged the government a token sum of one rupee and built the country's new parliament in just 17 months. In fact, Tata Group won the construction bid for 8.619 billion rupees ($105 million) which the government declared on its official website. The reported cost estimate later rose to about 12 billion rupees. The completion date of the new building has repeatedly been delayed and is now expected in August 2023.

"New Parliament House Two new records It was built in merely 17 months TATA bulit it and only 1 rupee as a cost to the govt. This is TATA 's gift to nation (sic)," reads the false post shared on April 3, 2023.

Tata Group is an Indian multinational conglomerate with businesses spanning consumer products to steel.

The post included multiple photos of Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi touring the new parliament building, which were published by the country's Press Information Bureau on March 30, 2023 (archived link).

Screenshot of the misleading post, taken April 18, 2023.

The construction is part of the government's Central Vista project, which is revamping British colonial-era government facilities including a new parliament building, a common central secretariat and a new office and residence of the prime minister (archived link).

The false claims about the one rupee price of the new parliament building were also shared in Hindi here on Facebook and in English here on Twitter.

In fact, Tata Group won the bid to construct the parliament building in September 2020 at the cost of 8.619 billion rupees (archived link).

The Times of India reported in January 2022 that the cost of the building grew by nearly 24 percent to around 12 billion rupees (archived link).

The gross estimate of the planned development under the Central Vista project is 200 billion rupees, according to its official website (archived link).

Delayed completion

Construction on the new parliament building started in January 2021, The Indian Express reported on January 16, 2021 (archived link).

However, the completion date has been repeatedly delayed, with the latest operational date set for August 2023, according to media reports (archived link).

A government update on January 18, 2023 said interior construction on the new parliament building was still in progress (archived link).

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