India halts work on Taj Mahal tourist complex

The Indian federal government has ordered a state-run company building a tourist complex near the Taj Mahal to stop work because the project violates laws protecting the 17th century monument, reports said today.

Tourism and Culture Minister Jagmohan, who goes by one name, has also ordered a probe into how the Government-funded project in the city of Agra in northern Uttar Pradesh state was originally approved, a ministry spokesman said.

“I have directed the state government to stop work immediately,” the Indian Express quoted Jagmohan as saying. I will not let this happen.”

The Taj Mahal was built by Mogul Emperor Shah Jahan as a monument to his love for his favourite wife, Mumtazmahal, who died giving birth to their 14th child.

An army of 20,000 stone masons, gem cutters, marble fitters and labourers toiled for 22 years to build the stunning white-marble monument.

The tourism complex would be a one-and-a-quarter corridor filled with shopping malls, amusement parks and restaurants on the banks of the Yamuna River which flows behind the Taj.

The development would stand just 330 yards from the world-famous monument.

Work on the project, by the state-run National Project Construction Corporation, began in May, although no elevated structures have yet appeared.

The company could not be reached for comment today. The Times of India quoted Unesco officials in New Delhi as saying that the UN body might have to strike the Taj Mahal off its World Heritage List if the project were to go ahead.

Jagmohan told the Indian Express that permission had not been obtained from his ministry, which is responsible for the upkeep of historical monuments.

The project violated India’s Archaeological Sites and Remains Act of 1958, he said.

It is not clear which government department approved the £23.8 million project, he said.

In 1996, India’s Supreme Court ordered the closure of all factories near the Taj Mahal because their emissions were causing discolouration of the palace’s white marble brickwork.

Last year, the state-run Archaeological Survey of India began work to restore the original whiteness of the monument.