Christian council urges heritage panel to apprise missionary schools before conferring heritage tag

NEW DELHI: The Bengal Christian Council has urged the West Bengal government to inform the authorities of Christian Missionary educational institutions before giving heritage tag to any of their buildings in future. The council in a statement on Friday said it will make a formal appeal to the appropriate authorities "to do away with such a cosmetic tag." It also wondered if giving a heritage tag to buildings serves any practical purpose.

Council president Paritosh Canning said it had been noticed that many such organisations had been declared as 'heritage structures' by the state 'Heritage Commission' though the respective authorities of schools are never informed about such a declaration.

"In hindsight, while such declarations may seem to add a touch of importance and glamour to such old buildings, in practical terms they serve no purpose. While regular maintenance and renovation costs are huge, receiving grants from the Heritage Commission remains a distant hope, to be precise," he added.

Appeal for more autonomy in managing school properties

"Under these circumstances, we are contemplating making an appeal to the appropriate authority to do away with such a cosmetic tag to enable us to arrange on our own, to keep the buildings in good condition for years to come, with regular, relevant maintenance, upkeep and renovation," he said.

The request follows a submission made in December last year by La Martiniere School for Boys and La Martiniere School for Girls, both 188-year old institutions, to the state heritage commission to remove the structures from the list of Grade I Heritage Buildings on the ground that the minority institution has the "fundamental right to freely manage and regulate their property so that the "ability to make necessary repairs and renovations is not impeded."

Thanking West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee for granting minority status for schools and staff appointment rules, the council said, "Our centuries-old educational institutions - needless to say, all the Christian Missionary Educational Institutions in Kolkata and all over West Bengal - are more than a hundred years old and few have already crossed two hundred years."

"Bengal Christian Council is earnestly requesting the chief minister to look into the severe challenges which the heads of institutions of the Christian Missionary schools have been facing for a long time regarding normal approvals of teaching and non-teaching staff matters, regarding non-receipt of uniform grant for school dress code (all the missionary schools maintain their own dress code in consonance with the legacy)."