Abstract:
India’s cultural heritage and, in particular, its archaeological and built heritage is unparalleled in the world. India has one of the largest geo-political expanses and one of the greatest volume and diversity in culture “that has left a huge corpus of built heritage across the country.
A glimpse of this richness and variety can be seen in the form of monuments and archaeological sites, 3,678 monuments and sites including 20 world heritage properties, to date, that are protected by the Archaeological Survey of India (hereafter ASI). Their sheer magnitude in number alone is overwhelming besides the fact that these are iconic symbols of India’s diverse cultural expressions and historic continuity.” It, indeed, is a matter of proud for the country, but how does the site respond to protected status is a concern. Whether or not, the status has brought any change to the designated site in our country, needs to be focused upon. The thesis briefly explains the ASI background, the current nomination process and after effects of it being a protected site. The purpose of the research is to formulate a framework to evaluate the effectiveness of the designation of such sites across the country. For the process of evaluating effectiveness of ““Protected monuments” in India, three areas of significance are identified, namely – socio cultural, economic and sustainability. This study is limited to deriving an outline for evaluation of monuments only and validating the framework on one of the site. The framework for evaluating these levels is based on certain criteria that are identified from the existing reports and criteria’s to measure heritage performance of built heritage in different contexts.
