Embarking on the ambitious plan to preserve and spread awareness about the architectural heritage of the City Beautiful, the UT Administration would bring out a booklet on the rich architectural legacy of the city.
The 18-member Chandigarh Heritage Conservation Committee (CHCC) in its meeting held on Wednesday decided to expedite the work on bringing out a small booklet on the architectural value of Chandigarh.
The Committee decided that the UT Administration should bring out a small booklet on the rich architectural legacy of the city and distribute it free of cost across various city schools and colleges to sensitize young citizens of its importance and the need for preservation and conservation of Chandigarh heritage aiming to involve enlightened citizens with attachment to the city.
During the meeting, the Committee also made an observation that at present the Capitol Complex is out of bound for most citizens and as a result, most of them are unaware of this important architectural legacy of the city. Therefore, efforts should be made to open up this place for guided tours backed with state of the art infrastructure, maintenance and upkeep of this area for realization of its architectural value.
KK Sharma, Adviser to the UT Administrator while talking to The Pioneer said, “In an endeavor to spread awareness among the masses about the architectural legacy, the UT Administration has planned to bring out a small booklet on Chandigarh.”
He said, “The booklet aims at spreading awareness about the architectural masterpieces and other significant structures of Chandigarh.”
Sumit Kaur, UT Chief Architect said, “We are working to bring out a booklet on architectural legacy of the city. For this purpose, a sub-group under the chairmanship of Secretary, Department of Culture along with Professor Rajnish Wattas and Urban Planning Department has already started working.”
During the meeting, the CHCC also discussed the agenda of bringing architectural changes in proposed new green building to be constructed by the Chandigarh Housing Board. The Committee was of the view that changes should be brought keeping in view the architectural controls. There is a need to carefully detail out the plan as the CHB building would come up along Jan Marg - the ceremonial boulevard.
The Committee also decided to restore the second block of old Architects building Sector 19 and recommended that the office of CHCC should be set up within it at the earliest.
The members approved and appreciated the proposal of setting up of new Tourist Information Centre at Capitol Complex, which is aimed at easing the cumbersome process of getting permission for sightseeing in the Complex.
During the meeting, it was also decided to expedite the process of framing heritage regulations for the city. For this, a UT sub-committee of experts is already studying the Town and Country Planning Organization (TCPO) framed model heritage regulations.
The TCPO, a technical arm of Union Ministry of Urban Development (MoUD) has framed model heritage regulations after taking inputs from the states of Gujarat and Maharashtra.
The model heritage regulations framed by the TCPO consists sections including preparation of heritage list, criteria for listing, grading of the listed buildings/precincts, development control, existing plans and projects, incentive uses for heritage buildings among others.
The UT’s heritage regulation draft proposal would be put forward for discussion in a meeting of CHCC for approval. And, later the same would be sent to MoUD for final approval.
The 18-member CHCC in its first meeting in January had decided to constitute a Sub-Committee of experts including town-planners, chief architects and other architectural experts from across the region to frame heritage regulations for the union territory of Chandigarh.
On the directions of MoUD, the CHCC was constituted last year to supervise the architectural preservation plans in the City Beautiful.