Due to G20 Summit in Delhi is cleaned and beautified. The monuments are also getting a makeover like never before. But the hurry to make centuries-old fragile monuments pretty and welcoming, some historians say, is turning into a rush job.

In the run up to the G20 Summit, New Delhi has received a $120 million facelift.

Civic agencies across the central and state government have been working for months to transform the capital city into a gleaming emblem of modern India -a fluorescent, flamboyant, fitting host to the world’s largest economies.

And in the middle of all this modernity and novelty, Delhi’s history is also receiving some much-needed care. Monuments and heritage buildings across the city are being restored and updated- but according to many experts worry that it is conservation in name only.

Monuments like the Quli Khan’s tomb in Mehrauli Archaeological Park and a late Mughal-period Mosque in Lodhi Garden have suddenly turned pink with plaster, and are sporting new fittings like lights. One unroofed circular monument built by a British officer in the early 19th century in Mehrauli Archaeological Park has also abruptly acquired a roof, and is going to become a cafe.

Questions are being raised over whether the contractors and workers have been trained in historical preservation and if established conservationists have been consulted in this process.

The Archaeological Survey of India (ASI) is also hard at work for the G20 summit.

Besides INTACH and the Delhi government’s agencies, the ASI is the other major player overseeing the wellbeing of Delhi’s heritage monuments. The city has over 2,000 monuments and heritage buildings, and their maintenance is split between the ASI and Delhi agencies such as the Delhi Development Authority (DDA). For example, the ASI is responsible for the Qutb Minar, but the adjoining Mehrauli Archaeological Park is cared for by the Delhi state archaeological department and the DDA.

Flowers have been planted, streetlights have been installed, walls have been painted, roadside stalls demolished, and any potentially unsavoury sights for G20 delegates like night shelters for the homeless have been turned into parks.

Source: ThePrint