Indian Conservation Architects Community
Heritage & Conservation

Indian conservation Architects Community

Welcome to Indian Conservation Architects Community: Membership drive is going on.... Welcome to Indian Conservation Architects Community: Membership drive is going on.
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Manifesto of the ICAC

Heritage is manifest in both tangible and intangible forms and in its diversity defines the composite culture of the country. Beyond its role as a historic document, this unprotected heritage embodies values of enduring relevance to contemporary Indian society, thus making it worthy of conservation.
This ‘living’ heritage is not legally protected. The buildings and sites, which constitute it, are subject to demolition or unsympathetic interventions. The knowledge of traditional building skills with which it is associated is also in danger of being lost in the absence of patronage and official recognition. Conserving the ‘living’ heritage, therefore, offers the potential to conserve both traditional buildings and traditional ways of building.
Conserving the unprotected architectural heritage and sites ensures the survival of the country’s sense of place and its very character in a globalising environment. It offers the opportunity not only to conserve the past, but also to define the future. It provides alternate avenues for employment and a parallel market for local building materials and technologies, which needs to be taken into account when resources for development are severely constrained.
The tangible heritage includes historic buildings of all periods, their setting in the historic precincts of cities and their relationship to the natural environment. It also includes culturally significant modern buildings and towns. The intangible heritage includes the extant culture of traditional building skills and knowledge, rites and rituals, social life and lifestyles of the inhabitants, which together with the tangible heritage constitutes the ‘living’ heritage. Both tangible and intangible heritage, and especially the link between them, should be conserved.
Conservation of architectural heritage and sites must retain meaning for the society in which it exists. This meaning may change over time, but taking it into consideration ensures that conservation will, at all times, have a contemporary logic underpinning its practice. This necessitates viewing conservation as a multi-disciplinary activity.

  • Buildings and sites protected by ASI, SDA and other government or non-government agencies. Only the official and legal instruments of conservation and internationally accepted principles should be adopted here; ii Other listed buildings and sites which, though not protected by ASI, SDA and other government or non-government agencies, possessing heritage value or significance equivalent to that of protected monuments. Here too, the official and legal instruments should be adopted for their conservation;
  • The remaining listed buildings and sites both modern and historic, including those produced within the last hundred years. Here, the conservation strategy may adopt either the official and legal instruments of conservation or those rooted in indigenous building traditions. Hybrid strategies, inventively combining indigenous and official practices, can also be employed to conserve this heritage category. The decision to adopt indigenous practices should be based on the availability of skilled and knowledgeable raj mistris. In all cases a rationale for the decision taken to adopt one or another system of conservation must be recorded.

The overarching objective for undertaking conservation of unprotected architectural heritage and sites is to establish the efficacy of conservation as a development goal. What to conserve will, therefore, be determined by those strategies of conservation, which accommodate the imperatives of development and the welfare of the community while seeking economically to achieve maximum protection of the significant values of the architectural heritage and site.

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