UNESCO World Heritage Site Status: Charaideo maidams chosen as India's sole nomination

STAFF REPORTER

GUWAHATI: The Central government has finally nominated the maidams of Ahom royalty in Charaideo as India's sole nomination for declaration as World Heritage Site by the UNESCO (United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization).

Talking to the media on Saturday, Chief Minister Himanta Biswa Sarma said that the Centre's decision to make the Charaideo maidams India's sole nomination for the UNESCO World Heritage Site status marks "a great day for Assam". The relevant dossier will be dispatched to the UNESCO office at Paris today itself, he said.

Sarma informed that the state government had started the process of trying to obtain UNESCO World Heritage Site status as far back as 2014, and had appointed a team of experts to prepare the required dossier. The state government has been also maintaining coordination with the Centre in this regard since then, he said.

The Chief Minister said that 50 dossiers had been prepared for nominating various historical, cultural and natural sites from across the country to the UNESCO, but Prime Minister Narendra Modi chose to nominate the Charaideo maidams due to his for Assam. Elaborating o the issue, Sarma said that a model of a maidam was shown to the Prime Minister during the celebrations of the 400th birth anniversary of Lachit Barphukan in New Delhi recently, and Modi was also briefed about the significance of the maidams. This may have induced the Prime Minister to nominate the Charaideo maidams, Sarma said.

The Chief Minister said that an experts' team from UNESCO will visit Charaideo in September next for spot inspection of the maidams. The state government will have to address any queries or points that the UNESCO team may raise during their visit, he said.

Sarma informed that there are four phases of World Heritage Site selection or rejection by the UNESCO. The first is immediate declaration during the first inspection of the relevant site; the second one is the reference phase, where further input is sought; the third phase is the deferral phase, where the nomination is kept pending; and the last phase is outright rejection.

The final decision of the UNESCO will be announced in March, 2024, Sarma said, adding, "I am hopeful that we will be successful".

It is pertinent to mention that maidams represent the late medieval (13th to 19th century CE) mud-burial tradition of the Tai-Ahoms in Assam, which lasted 600 years till the end of the Ahom reign. Out of 386 maidams explored so far, the 90 royal burial mounds at Charaideo are the best-preserved representatives and most complete examples of this tradition. Charaideo's royal maidams demonstrate an outstanding new type of funeral architecture in Assam in the geo-cultural context of South Asia and South East Asia.

Also Read: Assam CM: Centre Decides To Request UNESCO For Designation Of Charaideo Maidam As World Heritage Site

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