Mall plan puts Jama Masjid at risk

New Delhi: It's one of the largest mosques in Asia, the most important one in India and the last architectural wonder of Shahjahan.

The ancient structure is now under threat, not from terrorists but from the Municipal Corporation of Delhi, which is all set to redevelop the area by digging dangerously close to the ancient structure.

The MCD is soon going to take over the area around the mosque and develop basement shopping malls almost at a handshaking distance of the mosque foundation.

The MCD authorities have approved a Rs 1200-crore plan for the revamp of the precincts of Jama Masjid complex which, experts say, can threaten the very survival of the mosque in the long run.

The plan is to build a 60-feet-deep four-storey basement complete with a shopping mall, which will comprise over 600 shops and a three-tier parking space to accommodate 4,500 cars, 4,000 two-wheelers and 60 buses.

The MCD's plan is shocking. The 60-feet-deep basement will begin just 30 metres from the footsteps to the mosque, directly affecting the very foundation of the splendid structure.

The country's leading structural engineers say there is a grave danger to the mosque if the plan is implemented. They warn that vibrations from the digging itself may be enough to pull down the mosque, and even a slight tremor of an earthquake may cause the Masjid fall.

"It is a simply balanced structure. Delhi is an earthquake zone and when you dig so close to the Masjid, you don't know what repercussions it will have. It may be the beginning of the end," first town planner Syed Shafi points out.

The mosque is a Waqf property and the maintenance of its area is done by the MCD. The Union Ministry of Culture has been trying to declare it as a national monument for several years now. But the mosque, as of now, remains nobody's baby.

"It should be protected. Had it been protected by now, then none of this would have happened. Then you could not build anything in a 300-metre area around the mosque and nothing could have come up within 100 metres around the monument," former Union urban development minister Jagmohan says.

To the few supporters of the project, the MCD plan is a way to revive Jama Masjid. "I am happy to know about the plan. I support it fully and would want the work to begin fast," the Shahi Imam of the mosque, Syed Ahmed Bukhari, says.

But the MCD has forgotten the basics. Before finalising the project, it has not done the compulsory structural and heritage impact assessment.

MCD officials say such an assessment can wait. "We have said we will get a technical assessment done once we begin work," MCD Deputy Commissioner Vijay Singh says.

The MCD's plan is shocking as just 30 meters away from the Masjid steps the revamp project begins from where the 60-feet deep basement will start.

The basement will directly hit and damage, the very foundation of the splendid mosque.

In fact, experts believe that the vibrations from the digging itself will be enough to pull down the mosque.

Even a slight tremor of an earthquake will ensure that the Masjid falls.

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