Vidhana Soudha

The Vidhana Soudha is the seat of the Karnataka state legislature, built between 1952 and 1956 under Chief Minister Kengal Hanumanthaiah. The architect, B. R. Manickam, was instructed to produce something distinctively Karnatakan and grand enough to shake off the perceived British architectural dominance of Bangalore — the result is a four-storey neo-Dravidian-Mysore-style edifice covering 60 acres of floor space, with a 60-metre central dome and porticoes copied from the Nandi Temple at Lepakshi. The granite was quarried from a site in Mallasandra, hand-finished by traditional Karnatakan stonemasons. The four corner domes echo Mysore's Mahalaxmi Temple. The 12-pillared portico facing Cubbon Park bears the inscription 'Government work is God's work' on the architrave. On Sunday evenings the building is floodlit, drawing camera-toting families to the lawn opposite. The interior is not generally open to the public. Photography from the surrounding roads is permitted. Across the road sits the Attara Kacheri (the High Court), a deep-red Greco-Roman building that makes a striking complement.