HYDERABAD: With 44 monuments across the country in the tentative list for UNESCO’s World Heritage Site (WHS) and the State government too turning its attention towards Ramappa Temple, the chances of Charminar or Golconda Fort to have a shot at the coveted tag in the near future is uncertain, despite MAUD and IT minister KT Rama Rao claiming that the State government was working towards nominating the two structures.
During a recent interaction with Twitteratti, Rama Rao while responding to a question on the ways to improve tourism, said, “We’ve already privatised sanitation maintenance in important tourist attractions for better maintenance. We are working on getting the WHS status to attractions like Charminar and Golconda.”
However, Charminar was not even included in any tentative list for WHS, according to officials. In 2010, the nomination for Charminar, along with the Qutub Shahi Tombs and Golconda Fort, was submitted to UNESCO. Subsequently, Charminar was dropped from the list citing concerns of encroachment around the monument, an ASI official said.
Now, it seems that the State government had shifted its attention towards Ramappa Temple in Warangal, despite having a stakeholders meeting in January 2019 which explored the scope and action plan to get Qutub Shahi Tombs and Golconda Fort in the World Heritage Site (WHS) list.
The central government approved Ramappa Temple for the contention in 2019 list after Chief Minister K Chandrasekhar Rao took up the matter in New Delhi. Now, experts say that it will take a long time for Telangana to get another chance to send in their nominations.
According to another official, "There are around 40 monuments across the country in contention for the WHS tag. It is not possible for the same state to send in their nomination every year. In 2020, the Centre is most likely to send in other nominations."
According to reports, the Central government is making a pitch for the ancient Buddhist site of Sarnath in Varanasi. Apart from the separate nomination of Golconda Fort and Qutub Shahi tombs (along with Charminar, which was later dropped), the two monuments are also a part of another nomination — Monuments and Forts of the Deccan Sultanate.
This is a serial nomination which includes several monuments from Karnataka like the Adil Shahi monuments in Bijapur. "In 2019, the Deccan Sultanate nomination was dropped and the Karanataka government did not expect it," an official said.
Now, with a long list of monuments and sites in line for the tag, it remains to be seen how the State government makes a pitch for Golconda, Charminar or Qutub Shahi monuments for the WHS tag.