CM Vijay's office is set to shift from the historic Fort St. George complex to the 10th floor of Namakkal Kavignar Maaligai, driven by an acute shortage of space, with the transition targeted for late August.
The Chief Minister's Office is set to move from its long-standing location inside the historic Fort St. George complex to the Namakkal Kavignar Maaligai (NKM), a 10-storey Secretariat annex within the same campus. The Public Works Department has begun preparatory work, with a two-month deadline set for the renovation.
CM Vijay has been functioning from the first floor of the Main Building at Fort St. George, where the CMO has been housed for more than six decades. Officials say the relocation has been driven primarily by an acute shortage of space, as the existing office has struggled to accommodate the large number of officials, visitors and delegations meeting the Chief Minister since he assumed office. The new premises will occupy the 10th floor of the NKM building, offering an unobstructed view of the Bay of Bengal, with the existing large dining hall likely to be converted into the CM's office.
Before settling on Namakkal Kavignar Maaligai, two other locations within the city were reportedly considered for a fresh administrative campus — the mofussil bus terminus at Koyambedu, and the Highways Research Station opposite Lok Bhavan — but both were set aside by CM Vijay in favour of remaining within the existing Fort St. George campus.
Tamil Nadu has seen several attempts to relocate its seat of government over the decades, most of which were eventually dropped. In 2002, then-CM J. Jayalalithaa proposed an administrative city near the heritage town of Mamallapuram, which did not proceed. The following year, she attempted to move the Secretariat to Queen Mary's College on the Marina seafront, and separately to Kotturpuram — both abandoned following public protests. It was the DMK government under M. Karunanidhi that finally built a new assembly and Secretariat complex in 2010 at Omandurar Government Estate; the succeeding AIADMK government led by Jayalalithaa reversed that decision within a year, restoring operations to Fort St. George — the Omandurar complex was later converted into a multi-speciality government hospital. CM Vijay's move to Namakkal Kavignar Maaligai will make him the first Chief Minister to physically move out of Fort St. George since that 2011 reversal.
As part of the transition, the Information and Tamil Development Department will relocate to Kalaivanar Arangam, while other departments will be accommodated elsewhere within the Fort St. George campus. Renovation work — including modifications to the conference hall and dining areas — began over the weekend, alongside security-related changes: a water fountain built at a cost of ₹8 lakh under the Fort St. George beautification project is slated for demolition, and the existing two-wheeler parking area will be removed to create a secure perimeter, a change that has raised concerns among Secretariat employees about reaching their sections for biometric attendance. The Tamil Nadu Secretariat Association has separately pressed for a bigger vision — relocating the entire Secretariat and Assembly complex to a more spacious site altogether, rather than a partial shift within Fort St. George.
Fort St. George Secretariat Administration CM Vijay July 25, 2026