The initiatives for the preservation of India’s built heritage during 2024-25 have been reviewed and assessed. The conservation work of the protected monuments is taken up by ASI as per the needs and requirement of the monument, after the approval of Annual Conservation Plan. The detail of expenditure on conservation of monuments is given as under :-

(Rs. In Crore)

 

To protect, promote and preserve various forms of folk art and culture throughout the country, the Government of India has set up seven Zonal Cultural Centres (ZCCs) with headquarters at Patiala, Nagpur, Udaipur, Prayagraj, Kolkata, Dimapur and Thanjavur. These ZCCs organize various cultural activities and programmes on a regular basis all over India for which they engage folk/ tribal artists to showcase their talents at national level. These artists are paid honorarium, TA/DA, local transportation, boarding & lodging etc. to enable them to earn their livelihood. The grant-in-aid released to all the seven ZCCs to organize various cultural activities and programmes during the last three years is as under:

(Rs. in lakh)

 

Also, the progress on the digitization of collection in various museums under Ministry of Culture is reviewed and assessed regularly.

The details of financial assistance given for setting up of new museums/development of existing museums are at Annexure-I.

Further, the Govt. of India has established the National Mission on Monuments and Antiquities (NMMA) in 2007 to prepare two national registers on Monuments (Built Heritage and Sites) and Antiquities across the country.

NMMA is conducting workshops in various regions to raise awareness and provide training programs to universities, colleges, NGO’s and other interested organisations.

Ministry of Culture has been using a software named “JATAN” for digitization of museums collections like coin, painting, manuscript, philately, decorative art, archaeology, bead, anthropology, arms and armour, terracotta, porcelain, central asian antiquity, numismatics, epigraphy manuscripts and artefacts. Till date 8 renowned National Level Museums and 2 ASI Museums have been digitized through JATAN Software. The above-mentioned project of digital repository of the collections of these Museums in technical collaboration with C-DAC, Pune along with a unified web portal at www.museumsofindia.gov.in on which the details of the collections of these museums along with their image are available. Digitized Articles till date can be viewed by accessing the following link

https://museumsofindia.gov.in/repository

Also, NMMA has documented and published data for 11,406 Built Heritage & Sites and 12,47,668 Antiquities. The data has been published at the NMMA website: http://nmma.nic.in

The ASI Annual Report for 2025-26 outlines details of works undertaken such as Conservation, Scientific Preservation, Excavation World Heritage Matter etc.

This information was given by Union Minister for Culture and Tourism Shri Gajendra    Singh Shekhawat in a written reply in Rajya Sabha today

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M Annadurai

Annexure-I

The details of financial assistance given for setting up of new museums/development of existing museums:

                                                                                                                (Amount Rs. in lakhs)

 

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