WHO DOES THE TAJ BELONG TO?

WHAT IF THE TAJ LOSES ITS WORLD HERITAGE TAG? WITH THE SUPREME COURT POSING THE QUESTION, THE CRUCIAL JOB OF HARMONISING THE OFTEN CONFLICTING GOALS AND EXPECTATIONS OF MULTIPLE STAKEHOLDERS FALLS ON THE GOVERNMENT. AND THE FUTURE OF THE TAJ DEPENDS ON

The Taj’s future depends on how far the state government can get the multiple stakeholders to work in harmony

What is this tamasha going on? Everything has become a joke. You can make a comedy show out of it.” Supreme Court Justices Madan B. Lokur and Deepak Gupta had just found out that there were still the same number of polluting industries around the Taj Mahal as there were 20 years ago. With this discovery on July 26, at least one point was confirmed: that the management of the Taj Trapezium Zone (TTZ), the 10,400 sq. km. area demarcated to protect 40 monuments from pollution, including the Taj Mahal, was a “flop”.

For the past one year, Justices Lokur and Gupta have been chipping away at a thousand and one details, to arrive at that one key question on July 30: “Who is in charge of the Taj?” At the ongoing hearings, they have noted that the TTZ authorities, the Archeological Survey of India (ASI), the Uttar Pradesh government, the Centre and its nodal agencies—the ministries of environment & forests, tourism and culture—along with their battery of lawyers, all speak in different voices. “Look, somebody has to take responsibility,” the bench remarked on July 30, pointing the finger at the “multiplicity of authorities”. With this, the apex court also summed up the three existential questions facing the Taj: Who owns it? Who is to look after it? Who is to profit from it?

On July 30, Attorney General of India K.K. Venugopal pointed out to the apex court that the ‘vision document’ for the long-term protection of the Taj, prepared by the UP government, could not be placed “in a final form” because other stakeholders needed to “give their suggestions on it”. And the Taj has many stakeholders. A reason why the Supreme Court had to lay down the who’s who of

the Taj (see graphic) on July 30. So now, director-general of ASI, Usha Sharma, will be in charge of maintenance, while the joint secretary of the environment ministry, R.S. Prasad, and commissioner of Agra division, K. Ram Mohan Rao, will jointly look at the TTZ. All future affidavits on the Taj can only be filed by the three nodal persons. The bench then directed that the vision document must be vetted by experts from INTACH, ICOMOS (International Council on Monuments and Sites), the Aga Khan Foundation, and petitioner and environmental lawyer, M.C. Mehta.

Does that mean the fate of the Taj now rests in their hands alone? Not really. The Supreme Court, working with the UNESCO, monitors and mandates conservation. The Government of India, with its four ministries, is responsible for decision- and policy-making but is subject to the apex court. The ASI, along with its branches—horticulture, chemical, conservation and museum—has jurisdiction inside and in the buffer zone. The CISF guards the gateways, while UP police and Taj Surakhsa man the area.

A lot of the factors affecting the Taj are outside its boundaries: the TTZ, formed in 1998 by the ministry of environment, was to ‘monitor the progress and implementation of various schemes for protection of the Taj’. But the crucial job of curbing pollution, sanitation, waterways, security and local tourism is handled by the state government, through the Agra administration, with the ADA (Agra Development Authority) and the Agra Nagar Nigam (ANN). As outgoing superintending archaeologist of ASI’s Agra Circle, Bhuvan Vikrama, says, “The ASI does all that it can within the Taj, but it has no authority over the biggest threats facing it, like air or water pollution. The state agencies need to get their act together.”

The concern with the Taj ultimately has to do with the conflict of interest of its various local stakeholders, which include the trade, hospitality and non-profit pressure groups. On August 10, when the TTZ commissioner invited Agra’s industrialists to share their views on the draft vision document, they rejected it. Rajiv Tiwari, head of the National Chamber of Industries and Commerce, says, “The people of Agra know what is best for the city, not outside agencies.” Do they?

—with inputs from Siraj Qureshi in Agra