Conservation, Restoration, Rebuilding: Archaeology, Temples and Monument-Making in Colonial India

Photo:
Kinchakeswari Temple complex, Mayurbhanj (Orissa), 1923.
Courtesy: ASI, New Delhi.

A lecture organised by the "Friends of the Kern Institute" by the Indian historian Dr. Sraman Mukherjee.

"This paper addresses central issues informing the debates around archaeological conservation of historic built heritage in colonial India. It focuses on two contested sites of religious practice and archaeological preservation: the Maha Bodhi Temple at Bodh Gaya (Bihar) and the Kinchakeswari Temple at Mayurbhanj (Orissa).
How did these practicing religious sites be-come implicated in the politics of archaeological conservation? How did they reconfigure modern monument-making policies and practices in the colony?
During the late 19th and early 20th century, these two temples emerged as critical sites of contestation between colonial archaeology‟s regime of self-professedly “secular” historicist jurisdiction over monuments and the “traditional religious” rights exercised at these sites.
Rather than viewing the secular, heritage-building thrust of archaeology and the politics of religious reclamations as binary oppositions, my approach argues for a co-constitution of secular and sectarian identities around heritage in colonial South Asia.‟

Dr. Sraman Mukherjee, associate fellow in the IIAS Asian Heritages cluster, holds a PhD in Arts from the University of Calcutta (2010), Department of History and Centre for Studies in Social Sciences. His academic research and teaching interests include modern and contemporary Indian history, with special focus on colonial power and politics of knowledge production, nationalism and politics of cultural patrimony. He also studies disciplinary and institutional histories of archaeology and museums in South Asia, decolonization and debates secularization of cultural heritage.

Drinks afterwards
We will round off our meeting with drinks, until 19.30 h. All those interested are invited! Hope to greet you on this occasion,
on behalf of the board of the Friends of the Kern Institute, Ellen Raven.