LONDON: World heritage sites like the Pyramids, the Taj Mahal and even Venice could soon become the exclusive playgrounds of the rich and famous, a report says.
Read more: Only rich to be allowed to visit Taj Mahal, Pyramids?
- The Times of India http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/india/Only-rich-to-be-allowed-to-vis…
The minute I read this line, the sleep that I was waking from vanished and a certain snese of hatered towards the so called powerful bosses who decide the rules sprung up! What shot into my mind immediately was: 'Who are these idiots to decide who get's to see the Taj Mahal and who does not? It is not that grandfather's property for them to lay out the rules. If the people of the country have instituted them as a body to take care of these monuments, they better be doing just that! Who are they to restrict entry into a place which is National heritage?? Where are those morons who are interpreting the preamble for us. Did it have a clause saying such and such will apply for the rich and the elite and such and such will not???'
Then a minute later some more issues cropped up. A child in free India may be born and educated such that he/she dreams of visiting many places which he has been educated to call his heritage. I dream so. There are numerous places that I have visited with a small sense of ownership towards them. No, I don't mean I go there and bring back my share (by pulling out the bricks and the art). I am talking about the more inner feeling of ownership.
Tomorrow when Ram Khilavan of Purnia District West Bengal will go on a journey for which he has waited for a lifetime - a journey into the Northern part of his country and land up in Agra, he will be greeted with a board. The board will be the so called rate card but implicitly it will read - "Do you have the savings of your lifetime ready to be given to get a glimpse of the Taj? No? Oh!. We have another place for you in Agra. the institution that it is famous for beside the Taj. Visit there and tell the Docs I thought that Taj is my heritage and I could see it."
I know I have talked about the India context alone. Two things, I had recently heard about raising of fees to visit Taj and secondly, I mostly think India alone. But I guess same idea applies to the global context as well.
All said, I am not saying that tings should not be done to preserve these monuments. May be people want to line up people in strict queues and just let them walk around at a proper pace. But making access so costly that only the rich and the elite afford it - the concept itself - I think - is the product of a person I am sure I am never going to get along with.
'Oh Lord Krishna, accha hua tumhari Dwarka doob gayee. Nahee to yeh zalim uspar bhee ticket laga dete.'
Translates to: ' Oh Lord Krishna, it's good that your Dwarka sank, er else these people would have put a ticket on it too'.