Corporates
need expertise to promote archaeological sites
Indian Express — June 22, 2001
The Taj Mahal,
felicitously, has found a corporate guardian in the Tatas. Before this, Humayun's tomb
came under the wing of the Oberoi group and Aga Khan Foundation, and the Indian Oil
Corporation adopted the Sun temple at Konark and the Qutab Minar. Ajanta and Ellora and
Fatehpur Sikri are among selected monuments still looking for suitable corporates. It is
an excellent idea in principle to get corporate India involved with the management of
designated national heritage sites. Looking after them is both horrendously expensive and
monumentally complex and evidently beyond the abilities of government bureaucracies. In
practice much will depend on how the corporates are chosen-those known for good corporate
governance, for example, will make better guardians-and on how well the rules have been
written. It is also important that their various responsibilities are well understood by
guardian companies and relevant government departments and ministries.
The big danger in arrangements where responsibilities are
shared between principals and agents is that some areas are not clearly assigned and
become no one's responsibility. Who will be the final arbiter on conservation issues in
each monument, experts employed by a company or the Archaeological Survey of India? What
kind of commercial spinoffs will be judged overly obtrusive and exploitative? And in Agra
one obvious question is, who will monitor air pollution in the environs of the Taj Mahal
on a continuous basis and take actin to eliminate it? Considering the costs and scope for
controversy, it is nothing short of a miracle that corporates have been willing to take on
the job. It is a huge undertaking. Since the public gardens, cultural centres, medical and
educational institutions endowed and managed by private or public sector corporate giants
tend to be among the best available, there is bound to be a great deal of public goodwill
at the start. Even so, for public acceptance of the corporates role to be well-founded,
agreements signed between them and the ASI, National Culture Fund and central/state
tourism departments, as the case may be, should be widely publicised. Such a course will
also help to ensure there will be no lowering of standards when the ASI and NCF sign on
more corproates for other monuments.
The
NCF, set up in 1996 to promote 'Indianness' by
preserving India's multicultural heritage, permits
and encourages a wide range of activities under
its adopt-a-monument scheme. These include development
of the environment in and around monuments, community
festivals and film and TV shoots at the sites.
Obvisouly, the degree of permissiveness will vary
from monument to monument. Making monuments accessible
to the public and yet protecting them from harm
takes experience and fine judgement. The ASI has
erred in both directions, erecting absurd barriers
at some places, being far too casual at others.
When the new managers take over, they will need
to be well-trained and well-briefed. Conservation
will be the primary challenge and the second will
be the encouragement of scholarship and public
understanding of artistic and cultural values.
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