Punjab Archeology Department Deputy Director Afzal Khan said on Thursday that materials used in reconstructing and repairing the four gates within the Walled City would be the same as the original materials used. The four gates, which are to be repaired as announced by the department on Wednesday, include the Sheranwala Gate, Kashmiri Gate, Bhaati Gate and Lohari Gate. These are probably in the worst of conditions and need repairing very badly. “We are going to be using a special kind of limestone called ‘Kasuri Choona’, which is found at the river banks of Sutlej-Beas and Ravi, and they are found in pebble form,” said Khan.
“This is then used in various forms,” he says. He said that the pebbles were then later prepared depending on how they would be used for the repairing. It could vary from plastering, to filling in cracks and crevices and using it for fine line plastering. The by products would be prepared by either mixing jute, or crushing bricks or even to leave it out in the sun in a special method which left the lime in a pasty form. “But this is not an easy process, and it requires technique and funds,” said Khan. “We could have used cement but we are not. We are using the original materials used. And as for the accusation of political motives, that is what people have said before when the Motorway was being built. We only have a few gates out of 12 and we must preserve them instead of thinking of these things,” he says.
He said that just like work was being done on Rohtas Fort, and Katas Raj Temple, work was being done on the gates and with a much lower budget. That work was far more important. “The idea came a year ago to work on these gates, so it wasn’t about elections,” said Khan.
Dr Farzand Masih, chairman of the Punjab Archeology Department, who was formerly on the technical advisory board of various committees in the Archeology Department, expressed his concern about the project.
“There is a method to doing everything and I have finally distanced myself from these projects because I do not agree with the way they are done,” he said. “These are decaying and sick buildings which need a proper doctor’s procedure and this procedure takes time,” he analogised. Dr Masih said that just like a diagnosis and preliminary tests take time, the conservation note of an archeological site also takes time.
“We need some prerequisite work, some excavation but the Archeology Department is careless about these aspects. For example, they have done construction work in the Katas Raj temple, but they probably didn’t even know what it looked it originally because they changed it around completely,” he exclaimed. “How can a patient be given direct medicine?”
At the same time, Afzal Khan has said that there are no official consultants on the gate repairing project announced by Hamza Shahbaz. “We are all trained here at the Department. But we do sometimes consult experts unofficially including Yasmin Lari, Sajida Vandal, Mehmood Hussain, Saifur Rehman Dar etc.”
