SOUTH ASIA boasts of several millennia of built heritage and living culture represented in the traditional architectural crafts. However, for each country in the region ‘conservation’ as it is understood today and preached by UNESCO reflects an understanding that was introduced as a result of colonial rule in one form or another.

In the 21st century, it may finally be time to reflect on a truly South Asian conservation philosophy or focus. A recognition that the traditional architectural craft techniques used to build our monuments may be the most suitable to repair these structures is now gaining ground. This is after several decades of engineers having replaced craftsmen as keepers of our shared built heritage in large parts of the region.

It is well established that by using traditional building materials – stone, earth, bamboo, timber, brick – our forefathers built splendid structures, from modest residences in wonderful cities to grand palaces, monasteries, temples, tombs, stupas and so on. For anyone who bothers to compare buildings built only a few decades ago to what is mushrooming in South Asian cities today, it is not easy to understand how our design and craft capabilities were lost within a few years of materials such as cement, steel and glass becoming easily available.

It appears that in the shift from the traditional to the ‘cheap’ modern, we have lost architectural craft skills that had the capability of creating millions of man-days of employment while ensuring that our cities had both a unique identity as well as a higher quality of life.

The principal challenge after the devastation of the recent floods and earthquakes in the region is how to rebuild appropriately without easy access to traditional materials, traditional craftsmen and traditional building techniques. With none of the South Asian countries investing in incentivizing conservation with subsidies for use of traditional building elements in modern construction or financial support to undertake conservation, it might already be too late to reverse the tide of soulless buildings that have sprouted in our countries – buildings that are silently causing health calamities by changing lifestyle patterns that have evolved over centuries. In 1997, on the occasion of the 50th anniversary of India’s independence, His Highness, the Aga Khan, gifted India a restored Humayun’s Tomb – a designated World Heritage Site. Completed in 2003, the garden restoration led to a manyfold increase in footfalls to the restored Mughal garden.

 

Following the success of the restoration of Humayun’s Tomb, the Aga Khan Trust for Culture (AKTC) was asked by the Government of India to undertake further work in the country and it was agreed that AKTC would undertake a large urban conservation project that would include conservation of several monuments coupled with major initiatives in socio-economic development focused on the residential communities of the adjoining Hazrat Nizamuddin basti as well as landscaping over 200 acres of a designated district park with a focus on ecological restoration.

Explorations of the archaeology of the Humayun’s Tomb World Heritage Site – a precursor to the more famed Taj Mahal – revealed that the building had suffered for well over a century because of inappropriate conservation methods. A million kilos of concrete was required to be removed from the roof, laid here in the 20th century, to prevent rainwater ingress; over 200,000 square feet of cement plaster was similarly required to be removed and replaced with traditional lime plaster. Original doors had been removed for firewood and the remnant tile work on the interiors removed and replaced with plain plaster.

Similar treatment was meted out to many South Asian buildings where well meaning repairs carried out using inappropriate modern materials not only compromised the original design intention but also set in a process of accelerated decay.

 

At Humayun’s Tomb, the conservation plan prepared and agreed at the onset with the Archaeological Survey of India established the intent of the AKTC conservation initiative to remove inappropriate past repairs and replace these with authentic repairs using traditional materials used in traditional building techniques by master craftsmen.

India, as with most South Asian countries, is fortunate that traditional craft techniques have survived. Stone carvers, masons and carpenters worked at Humayun’s Tomb with sandstone, quartzite, and lime mortar prepared with traditional tools as part of a multi-disciplinary team comprising conservation architects, engineers, historians, designers, among others, to restore the intention of the Mughal builders. Authenticity of material and form wherever compromised was restored to its earlier self. A similar conservation approach for the several other major monuments that stand abutting the Humayun’s Tomb has also ensured that the integrity of the World Heritage Site is not compromised.

If our built heritage in South Asia is to be passed on to future generations in a better state than we inherited and if the conservation of the built heritage is to be seen as a meaningful exercise rather than an elitist hobby, craftsmen need to be brought back to positions of responsibility as they were prior to the colonial era.

Unfortunately, architectural crafts in India have not received significant patronage for over a hundred years and if they have survived it is in part because most living craftsmen also practice alternate trades or farming for survival. Comparatively speaking, handicraft and handlooms have received some patronage though many would argue that government patronage is miniscule and thus almost irrelevant.

Patronage to building craftsmen need not necessarily be in the form of financial subsidies. It can take the form of awards for the use of traditional architectural crafts, not merely for conservation, but also using them extensively to construct modern buildings. In a little known development, the Delhi Urban Art Commission has mandated that two per cent of building costs be used for ‘artwork’ and this includes traditional building practices such as stone carving.

 

Unlike the practice in Europe or North America, heritage zoning in South Asia is not exhaustive. Consequently, even in ancient city centres such as Benaras, Nizamuddin, Ajmer or Mathura, any legal protection is limited to individual buildings, allowing the cityscape to change rapidly even in a matter of a few months. More recently, major infrastructure projects such as the Metro, mostly elevated, and flyovers, have had a major impact in Delhi, thus severely compromising urban quality and usability of these services to save a fraction of costs incurred in establishing such infrastructure.

By and large, there is little adherence to laws, and penalties are hardly recoverable. As such, if a future for our past historical legacy is to be kept intact, it is contingent on establishing how heritage preservation can lead to factors such as economic benefits, employability and improved quality of life that historic districts in the West provide.