National Mission on Monuments and Antiquities, Archaeological Survey of India, Ministry of Culture, Government of India
National Mission on Monuments and Antiquities, Archaeological Survey of India, Ministry of Culture, Government of India
India is perhaps one of the largest repositories of tangible heritage in
the world. A major part of this heritage is preserved in her monuments,
sites and antiquities of varied nature. The range of such relics, from
the past is indeed very vast and covers a long span of time i.e.
prehistoric to colonial times. The monuments, sites and antiquities
protected and maintained so far by Archaeological Survey of India and
State Archaeology Departments are only a fraction of the total
repository of the country. However, most of these have not been
documented in a uniform format which can provide a common platform to
the scholars, researchers and planners for reference, research and its
management in a diligent manner.
Today, the survival of our heritage has been endangered due
to climatic, natural and manmade effects. In the recent years there is
also an increasing trend of illicit trafficking of antiquities from
India. This is mainly due to lack of public awareness, ignorance of
law/act and also about the importance of documentation and preservation.
There are few cities in the country where number of important monuments
and heritage buildings has been listed from time to time by different
institutions and organizations but there is no comprehensive database at
one place. Therefore, a proper documentation is felt desideratum to
build a credible National database in a uniform format.
To address these issues, National Mission on Monuments
and Antiquities (NMMA) has been set up by Government of India with the
objective to document unprotected monuments and sites from both
secondary sources and antiquities from primary source in a prescribed
format. There are various available sources for documenting this
heritage which needs to be utilized and collated through a Mission
approach to create a credible National data base. This will take shape
of State wise as well as National register of unprotected monuments,
sites and antiquities.
Likewise, the existing data on antiquities are also
available in different format in the form of Registered Antiquities,
Catalogued antiquities with central and different formats adopted by
different organizations; it is difficult to bring this data base under
one umbrella. In this process, National Mission on Monuments and
Antiquities has prepared two uniform formats each for documentation of
Monuments, Sites and Antiquities and is actively involved in creating
the National data base.
NMMA welcomes suggestions and contributions for the
preparation of National register on Monuments, sites and antiquities.
No comments:
Post a Comment