Architectural convention to debate city heritage landscape

The Kolkata chapter of the Indian Institute of Architects and Credai, Bengal will hold a first-ever joint convention early next month to discuss the heritage landscape of the city.
The two-day convention, slated for March 3-4, is expected to hammer out an economic model which can help generate revenue for maintainence of the city's heritage structers.
"The maintenence cost has always been a factor for hertitage buildings. Why not an economic model through which revenue can be generated for their maintenence?" IIA Bengal chapter chairperson Gita Balakrishnan said.
Sureka group managing director and convenor of the convention Pradeep Sureka said, "We must fall back upon history and analyze our present to envisage our prospect."

He says that Kolkata is the right place to hold this convention as it is a melting pot of cultures - Indian, British, French, Dutch, Armenian, Chinese and more.
"Each of these variegated cultures finds expression in the layered built environment of the city," Sureka pointed out.
Balakrishnan said that there were over 450 architectural institutions in the country, of which Bengal had 7-8 while Maharashtra had about 80.