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| Source - Time of India- Anjali Joseph |
Heritage list set to expand
Will Include Residential Bldgs, Industrial Structures Beyond South Mumbai
Anjali Joseph | TNN
Mumbai: By the time the first Mumbai list of protected heritage buildings
came out in 1995, it was too late for the old admiralty building on V B
Gandhi Marg, Kala Ghoda. "It was a beautiful building that served as the
admiralty in the 18th century and it had a grand old wooden staircase, but
it was demolished,'' recalls writer Sharada Dwivedi.
Since 1995, the heritage list commissioned by the Mumbai Metropolitan
Region Development Authority (MMRDA) has managed to protect many if not all
of the buildings listed. But the original list, compiled in a tight
time-frame, concentrated on south Mumbai and principally focused on
Victorian neo-Gothic architecture, like CST or the high court building.
That bias will soon be corrected with the release of an updated heritage
list, which has been under preparation for over a year now.
Five agencies, commissioned by MMRDA to carry out the work of surveying
the existing list and the rest of the city, are due to present their
recommendations by early June. These will be reviewed by a sub-committee
that will include heritage experts Cyrus Guzder, Shirish Patel, Rahul
Mehrotra, Tasneem Mehta and Sharad Upasani (chairman of the heritage
committee) before the new list is sent to the MMRDA board of governors, the
civic heritage committee and finally the state government for notification.
"The existing list is quite south Mumbai-centric, and there are several
residential precincts and neighbourhoods which have a social or
architectural character that could also be listed,'' says architect Neera
Adarkar, one of the architects commissioned to work on the revised list.
"Some areas are hardly represented, like Kalbadevi, Mohammedali Road and the
typology of industrial buildings in those areas.''
The existing list also suffers from inaccuracies and inadequate
documentation, says Abha Narain Lambah, whose firm has worked on reviewing
the 1995 list. Reay Road station, for example, is classified as Grade I,
which would mean it is of national importance, while the HC building is only
Grade II. And, "some buildings are marked twice, with two different serial
numbers, and others on the list seem to have been demolished,'' says Lambah.
Some structures, like the Khada Parsi statue on a column near Byculla
station are Grade I listed but in poor condition, which is not recorded in
the list. The 2006 list will be more detailed and include photographic and
written documentation that makes the rationale of each listing more clear.
The listing process could be complete by early July, says MMRDA's N V
Kulkarni.
But Tasneem Mehta, a member of the sub-committee reviewing the suggested
changes to the list, says that once the list has been finalised, time will
be of essence. "If the government delays notifying the list, we worry that
structures could be lost. Already, in heritage precincts like Gamdevi, there
has been so much construction work. The state urban development department
needs to notify suggeste d precincts as fast as possible, otherwise it will
be neglecting its duty,'' says Mehta.
Mumbai's heritage listing process is virtually unique throughout the
Asia-Pacific region, says Mehta. But the list is not supported by state
incentives to encourage owners of heritage buildings to see the heritage tag
as an asset rather than a liability. There are several options, including
tax breaks or maintenance grants for the owners, or even, Mehta suggests, a
tourist cess that could be used to turn Mumbai's heritage structures into
the tourist attractions they deserve to be.
LAST MAN STANDING: The Khada Parsi statue on a column near Byculla station
is a Grade I listed structure but is in a poor condition
Publication: TOI; Section: Times City; Pg: 8; Date: 20/6/06
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