Secretary, Tourism & Culture, Kacho Mehboob Ali Khan chaired a meeting regarding the listing of historical/heritage sites and preparation & documentation of the history of villages of UT Ladakh.

Secretary, Kacho Mehboob said that the exercise will be unique and one of its kind in the country to list and document a UT’s heritage sites and the history of its villages. This will become a repository of Ladakh’s past and the current & future generations will benefit, which will encourage every history lover to further, explore and do research on Ladakh’s heritage and its history.

He said that the joint efforts of the departments of Tourism, Culture, Rural Development (RD), Panchayats with the technical assistance of the National Informatics Centre (NIC), (Leh/Kargil) and Archaeological Survey of India (ASI), Leh with utmost professionalism will be a historical initiative for preservation, restoration and promotion of heritage sites and in preparing a historical footprint of the villages of Ladakh.

The Director, RDD will form Sub-Committees for each village involving locals who have better knowledge of the history of their respective villages so that, as far as possible, authentic history of the villages can be prepared and documented. He also stated that after due consultation with domain expert appropriate committee at Block-level will be formed to verify and refine the list of heritage sites/village history prepared by the Committees/Sub-Committees.

The Secretary requested the BDCs to ensure active participation of the Panchayats & villagers in this important exercise.

It was informed that for the listing of historical/heritage sites a mobile “App” has been prepared by the NIC (Leh/Kargil) in collaboration with the Archives (Antiquities) Department, Ladakh, and ASI, Leh. A live demonstration of the “App” was also made by DIO, NIC (Leh/Kargil). The workshop will be conducted to give hands-on training on listing of heritage sites on the “App” to the Panchayat Secretaries (one Member of each Committee) on 15th January at Leh & Kargil.

The training will be followed by a week for trial uploading of listing of heritage site information on the “App” and thereafter, the Committees/Sub-Committees will start the exercise of listing of heritage sites and preparation of village history. The Secretary urged the Committees/Sub-Committees, BDCs, etc. to make this exercise/project a successful cooperative effort.