KMC introduces scientific grading system for heritage buildings amid legal scrutiny
Telegraph | 27 November 2024
The Kolkata Municipal Corporation (KMC) has designed a score sheet to grade heritage buildings based on select parameters to make the gradation system “more scientific” and less “subjective”.
The decision to have a more precise and “mathematical” approach to grade heritage buildings arose after the civic body faced flak in the courts for declaring some buildings as heritage structures but failing to cite an “objective basis” for doing so.
A few months ago, Calcutta High Court turned down Kolkata Municipal Corporation’s argument to declare a house on Karl Marx Sarani, where Michael Madhusuadan Dutta is believed to have lived, a heritage building, said Himadri Guha, a member of the civic body’s heritage conservation committee.
The court said the KMC’s arguments were based on “hearsay” and were part of “folklore” and the civic body could not provide proper documents supporting its claim.
“Some houses that should have been declared heritage buildings are not on the list. Some other structures that could have been outside the list have been included. I have asked the heritage conservation committee to follow a more scientific process for grading heritage buildings,” mayor Firhad Hakim said at an event to discuss “Refining Gradation: Heritage in Kolkata”.
The list, the mayor referred to, is the Graded List of Heritage Buildings, finalised in 2009 and published by the KMC. The list includes 1,392 structures as heritage buildings, but 305 of them have not been graded yet, said sources.
Presenting the changes in gradation methodology to the audience comprising architects and heritage specialists at Nandan, Guha said the three criteria to be examined are a building’s historical value, its architectural value and its use value. “The historical value and architectural value will each have about 40 per cent weightage, while use value will have about 20 per cent,” he said.
Guha said the 2009 list was prepared after a research. “It was a commendable job, but it has been 15 years since the list was prepared. We will only refine it,” he said.
KMC commissioner Dhaval Jain, also the chairperson of the civic body’s heritage conservation committee, said there have been instances when the courts wanted to know the “basis” for declaring a structure a “heritage building”.
“Most of the buildings were included in the heritage list by subjective analysis by experts, but they have often failed scrutiny in the courts. We have now prepared an objective method to grade the pending buildings,” saidJain.
Sources in the KMC said the civic body will approach the state government for funds to assign grades to the 305 buildings whose grading is pending.