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| Basadi Halli Adinatha Jain temple, Hoysaleswara,KA dreamline.com |
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| Basadi Halli Adinatha Jain temple, Hoysaleswara,KA dreamstime.com |
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| Sriranga Fort, Mandya, Karnataka. 3.bp.blogspot.com |
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| Srirangapatna Fort, Mandya. bengaluruvartha.in |
In the state of Karnataka, ASI and other departments linked to heritage structures, are bogged down by a variety of bottlenecks that have made the time-honored monuments slowly disappear soon beyond redemption.
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| Karnataka Monuments. ndiatimes.com |
The department of archaeology, museums, and heritage, unable to take care of too many monuments in the state, came up with a novel idea of turning responsible citizens into stakeholders to help preserve the heritage structures that connect us with the past. ''Adopt a monument'' has become a catchy slogan and their target is private parties or companies with corpus funds. The department had floated an expression of interest (EOI) for 34 monuments across the state - such as the Adinatha Jain Basadi in KR Nagar, Mysuru, Srirangapatna Fort in Mandya, Raja's Tomb in Kodagu, among others.
In the first phase, five monuments of the 34 structures, were announced initially and the remaining 29 sites were set-aside for 'adoption' in the second phase.
The department had high hopes on interested citizens to share the responsibility of their upkeep, while funds were expected from private companies to sanction funds from their corpus of corporate social responsibility (CSR) towards conservation initiatives.
The department of archaeology, museums, At the Global Investors’ Meet in the past had a dedicated stall at the convention to get the attention of the companies that could lend ''financial assistance so our monuments can be saved for posterity.”
Officials in the department said that selected companies would be asked to sign a memorandum of understanding (MoU) with the government for a five-year period. binding them to provide funds for basic conservation or development of basic facilities, or development of advanced infrastructure at the monuments. The department would retain ownership of the monuments, while the company would be entrusted the responsibility of maintenance and conservation.
The Department made an appeal to the companies seeking assistance to preserve historic structures in their respective districts. “The chief minister is expected to write to the private companies seeking their support to promote the ‘adopt a monument’ initiative.”
