Spain
comes to the aid of Varanasi
by Girish Kumar Dubey
Varanasi:
Varanasi could be the country's first World Heritage
City. Spanish experts, who converted Bilbao, once branded
as the 'ugliest city', into a popular tourist destination,
have come forward to share their secrets with Indian National
Trust for Art and Cultural Heritage (INTACH) to conserve
the heritage monuments here and develop a world class
infrastructure for the holy town. To this end, the Government
of Spain recently signed an agreement with INTACH to conserve
the monuments of Varanasi. Under the project, around 200
monuments, river banks that form a part of the heritage
city Varanasi will be conserved. "We have been making
efforts to conserve the monuments of Varanasi that form
the heritage city for the past four to five years. We
have appointed Heritage INTACH as the consultants. They
are surveying the monuments of Varanasi ," said RP Goswami,
Vice Chairman, Varanasi Development Authority. Tourists
visiting Varanasi are all praise for the city, which is
revered as one of the holiest cities by the Hindus in
India.
"Varanasi
is a very nice city, especially the Ganga. The sunrise
is really nice," said Jorish, a tourist from Vienna .
Situated on the banks of river Ganges, Varanasi attracts
a bulk of foreigners because of its temples, traditionally
embroidered silk saris and a quintessential oriental charm.
Tourists coming to Varanasi for spiritual enlightenment,
perform rituals on the river banks known as ghats. There
are 84 ghats in Varanasi , which are visited by a large
number of tourists, both domestic and foreign. Apart from
being a huge tourist destination, Varanasi is visited
by several international students and scholars to study
Indian culture and religion.
-Feb
17, 2009
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