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The year was 1952, and the club for parliamentarians then was on Mansingh Road. But something changed when the club shifted to Rafi Marg 16 years later. “There is never enough space for families to stay in the new place,” Deo regrets.
Nonetheless, Constitution Club has never faded from Deo’s routine list of hangouts. From playing cricket with parliamentarians to managing the club affairs as its secretary (sports), Deo’s date with the club is never given a miss.
Like, on Thursday, when the notice board at the now-renovated lounge displayed evening engagements of a book release by Union HRD Minister Arjun Singh, Deo was at work with member-friends. Outside his cabin, former MP Krishna Bose chatted away with a friend while a group of people gathered outside the club’s Speaker Hall for various events listed for the evening.
Despite the ensuing commotion, a brief question on their association with the club was still greeted with nostalgia. Deo rattled off names — all revered in history now, and many still active in politics — and detailed their association with the club. “From Pandit Nehru to Mamata Banerjee, everyone has been part of the club’s sporting culture.”
But 2007 brought in its wake renovation, and a much-anticipated exalted status from being a club with no fans to one willing to share dais with elite clubs of academicians and business czars. “There was a demand from the MPs, especially Akali leader Simranjit Singh, for a club that was fully-equipped in terms of modern facilities,” Deo says. “Many said they couldn’t pay hefty fees at five-star hotels, and may feared being denied membership.”
So, with a budget of Rs 4 crore and an additional Rs 1.5 crore from the Indian cricket board, the club now has a cafetaria, a spa and a gymnasium apart from a redeveloped billiards and table tennis room, a swimming pool, and three business centres.
The club’s renovation project, under the supervision of a committee appointed by Lok Sabha Speaker Somnath Chatterjee, is in final stages.
While the club’s basic structure has not been tampered with — it falls in Lutyen’s Bungalow Zone — the wooden doors have been replaced with glass doors and fresh paint on the walls. The fans no more shriek, and the torn curtains and sofa covers have been done away with. At the entry gates and parking, security checks have become stricter.
But Deo says the renovated look does not eat into the club’s “old world charm”. He says, “Nothing has changed except the exterior. There has been very little interference with the structure.”
With renovation, the once-neglected club is now seeing many visitors, and members dropping in with families. “It will be inaugurated in July but many members have already visited the place to check out the renovated,” club assistant manager Arvind Arora says.
But what has led to the renovation is changing aspirations of a young Lok Sabha, Deo insists, that saw MPs seeking a modern club instead of looking for club memberships elsewhere. “At 25, I was one of the youngest MP in 1967,” he says, “and most parliamentarians who visited the club then were elderly people. Today, young MPs are more fitness-conscious and make demands on cultural activities. The club’s changing face is an expression of changing aspirations of the country’s elected representatives.”
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