Would architects of the distinction of Dr Charles Correa and Habib Rehman and the famous historian Prof. Narayani Gupta seek out a job vacancy by reading through the pages of employment newspaper Rozgar Samachar?
The ministry of urban affairs, led by Mr Kamal Nath, believes so. In an unprecedented move, the ministry of urban affairs has put out an advertisement in Employment News Paper Rozgar Samachar (ENPRS) to select new members of the prestigious Delhi Urban Art Commission (DUAC).
The present DUAC’s three-year term is coming to an end on June 2, and the ad will help select its new members. Its present team, including historian Nayanjot Lahiri, landscape expert Mohammad Shaheer, conservation architect Ratish Nanda and chairman architect K.T. Ravindran, an architect with the Delhi School of Planning and Architecture, have expressed shock at this development especially since it has been a largely nominated body with top architects, city planners and historians.
“Money has never been a consideration, since we are paid an honorarium of `650 sitting fee for an entire day,” said a sitting member. “In the past, people of the calibre of Habib Rehman and Sankho Chaudhri were chairmen of the DUAC.”
It’s present chairman, the well-known architect K.T. Ravindram who has been associated with DUAC for the last six years, has expressed apprehension at this development. “With the ad placed in the ENPRS, anyone is fee to apply for this job. When I made some enquiries, I was told that the ministry now planned to set up a search committee to make these appointments.”
The DUAC was set up by in 1973 to advise the government on the key issues of preserving, developing and maintaining the aesthetic quality of urban and environmental design in Delhi.
The DUAC meets on a weekly basis and looks at a vast range of issues from new Metro lines and the Games projects as well as ways to “improve” Shahjahanabad as also examine the proposals on Khirkee village and the controversial Sunheri Bah project.
A senior bureaucrat in the ministry of urban affairs admitted off the record that he too was “horrified” by these developments, “but given the present circumstances, no one was in a position to over rule the decision of the minister,” he said.