The handsome DGP building after restoration.

• New wing of the DGP building retains the old façade, but old police stations continue to be razed.

Work is proceeding swiftly on the construction of the new wing of the Director-General of Police’s office on the Marina. And it is heartening to see that the new three-storeyed structure has, maintaining the same height, retained the same façade as the two-storeyed original building that stands next to it. The Police have kept the promise made when the demolition of the DGP Building was stayed and its restoration ordered by the Madras High Court: of developing a building identical to the original parallel to it. Unfortunately, the same heritage-consciousness has not been seen when it comes to the preservation of some of the historic police stations in the city.

The preservation and restoration of the DGP Building has been a shining but somewhat a solitary example of heritage conservation in Chennai. When in the 1990s the High Court stayed the demolition of the building and urged that it be restored and used, the police accepted this judgement and also committed, when it came to the façade, that all additional structures on the campus would follow the same design, thereby ensuring uniformity. They have remained true to their word and, when lit up at night, the campus looks stunningly beautiful.

The same cannot, however, be said of police buildings elsewhere in the city. The Traffic Commissioner’s office in Egmore was demolished sometime back and a ten-storey building is being constructed on the site. The old prison opposite the Central Station awaits demolition and pleas to have at least a small portion retained to house a prison museum have not been heeded. Several police stations in various parts of the city, including Mount Road, Flower Bazaar, Egmore, Pulianthope, Tondiarpet, Elephant Gate, Chintadripet and Mylapore, all of them century-old structures, made way for new buildings, none of them conforming to any uniformity in design. In fact, no two new police stations now look alike and this flies in the face of the expected logic that buildings such as police stations ought to have a standard look about them to enable easy identification. The old structures followed a uniform layout and elevation. Today, the Mount Road (Spencer’s) station has a façade that vaguely copies the erstwhile Spencer façade, while the one in Flower Bazaar looks like a suburban bungalow and the one on Village Road looks like a shrunken castle of sorts.

Not all the old police stations have been demolished, however. For instance, the old buildings at Mylapore (Kutchery Road) and Greame’s Road have been retained and splendidly cleaned up, while modern structures, providing additional space, have come up in the rear. This is a good practice that the police would do well to emulate when it comes to other buildings in its possession. But such examples have been few and far between. Last week, the police station in Seven Wells, built in the 1890s, was demolished

At present, any uniformity in policy would not appear to be even remotely in the reckoning. In the meanwhile, heritage enthusiasts keep their fingers crossed and hope for the best.