Petition against Govt. move on Taj maintenance

NEW DELHI, JULY 8. The Government move to entrust the maintenance of the Taj Mahal with private hands has been challenged in the Delhi High Court through a petition in public interest.

The United Communist Party of India petitioned the court, saying private organisations would not protect the heritage but only their business. The petition also opposed the proposal to give the maintenance of the Red Fort to a private organisation being considered by the Government, saying the concern of these organisations would be profit.

In the case of the Taj Mahal, there was an income of Rs.40 lakhs per day and the expenditure on maintenance was not more than Rs.50, 000 per day, it added.

The gate collection from Red Fort was Rs.24 lakhs per day, which was about 60 per cent more than the amount required daily for maintenance, Mr. Sugriva Dube, counsel for the party, told the court.

During the last fiscal, there was an income of about Rs. 85 crores from the monuments and there was a requirement of about Rs. 69 crores for their maintenance and security. The reason some `vested interests' were trying to take over the buildings was that they could make up to Rs. 100 crores as commercial earnings, the petition said.

``Why was it that only very prominent monuments were being considered to be given to private parties, why not the fort of tribal King Madania in Palamau district or the monuments at Asureshwar and Prachi valley in Orissa?'', Mr. Dube asked. Besides a restraint on handing over the possession of the Taj Mahal, Red Fort and other such monuments to private hands, the petition also sought a `budget' for maintenance of monuments throughout the country and also to invest the income from the monuments in maintaining them.

According to a recently singed MoU, the Taj Group of Hotels, a Tata group enterprise, and the Archaeological Survey of India (ASI) joined hands towards preservation and upgrade of facilities at the Taj Mahal.

- UNI

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