Govt goes all out to get Delhi’s name in UNESCOs heritage cities

Delhi chief minister Sheila Dikshit is going all out to ensure that the national Capital gets to the UNESCO's list of World Heritage Cities. Nivedita Khandekar reports.

Delhi chief minister Sheila Dikshit is going all out to ensure that the national Capital gets to the UNESCO's list of World Heritage Cities.


Dikshit called a meeting of all agencies concerned to iron out the issues required for completing the formalities. The Delhi administration has already submitted the documents for inclusion of Delhi in the tentative list.

HT Image

India has 28 World Heritage Sites, including three — Humayun's Tomb, Qutb Minar and Red Fort — in Delhi but not a single C.

"(Comparing) the guidelines received from the Union Ministry of Culture, there were certain lacunae in what we had projected for the city, including intangible heritage," Dikshit told HT.

"For instance, the Chandni Chowk area under Shahjahanabad," she said.

Chandni Chowk, part of Shahjahanabad, one of the nominated heritage areas, has a mix of places of worship belonging to different religions. "We were headed in one direction, the ministry (needed) something else. It was basically a coordination meet with all agencies," Dikshit added.

Officials of Ministry of Culture (government of India), Archaeological Survey of India, Delhi's own Department of Archaeology, Delhi Tourism and Transportation Development Corporation (DTTDC) and the Indian National Trust for Arts and Cultural Heritage (INTACH), the not-for-profit NGO working in the field of conservation, attended the meeting.

DTTDC is the nodal agency while INTACH is to prepare the dossier to be sent to the UNESCO. Meanwhile, the ministry of culture has set up an advisory committee on the matters related to the tentative list of world heritage sites in India and make suitable recommendations.

Said AGK Menon, INTACH's Delhi chapter chief, "We have assured (Dikshit) that we would ensure that our job is done in the best possible way."

The city will have to be first enlisted in the 'tentative list' of World Heritage Cities of the UNESCO, after which the actual procedure for recognition is initiated by the world body.