New Delhi: Conservation, exploration and excavation come to mind whenever the Archaeological Survey of India (ASI) is talked about. Turns out excavation is the last in the pecking order.
So much so that the expenditure remained less than 1 percent of the ASI’s budget in the last 10 years. The figures speak for themselves—Rs 9,652.01 crore was allocated for the 2014-2024 period of which Rs 63.27 crore (i.e., 0.65 percent) was spent on excavations.
From 2014 to 2019, the amount spent on excavations was Rs 28.46 crore. The spendings saw a slight uptick as it was Rs 34.81 crore from 2020 to 2024.
On the face of it, paucity of funds cannot be a reason. A look at Comptroller and Auditor General (CAG) numbers show that budget allocations nearly doubled in the same period from Rs 680.05 crore in 2014 to Rs 1,278 crore this year.
Furthermore, the CAG documents and numbers from Parliament show that more than 90 percent of the budget allocated to the ASI was spent on the conservation of monuments (41 percent) and salaries of the staff (56 percent) alone.
The remaining was divided under heads such as 2 percent on maintenance of site museums among others.
In its 2022 follow-up report, the CAG had highlighted that the ASI is spending less than 1 percent of the budget on actual exploration and excavation.
That year saw the Ministry of Culture assure Parliament’s Public Accounts Committee (PAC) that it will increase the amount spent on exploration and excavation activities to 5 percent of the total budget. But, there’s no change even after three years.
“It’s a sad reality that there is no balance between allocations. The ASI is going backward academically as funds are not allocated for excavation projects,” said an archaeologist, who has to her credit of working at many sites in north India.
She wondered why many monuments were in bad condition if such a large portion of the budget is spent on conservation projects. “It means the amount is not utilised properly. Even our monuments are under-staffed.”
There are 3,685 centrally protected monuments and sites under the ASI’s jurisdiction in the country. Operating under the culture ministry, the government agency doesn’t come out with annual reports detailing its allocation and expenditure.
To be sure, the ASI’s lopsided expenditure has caught the public’s attention from time to time. For instance, in 2016, Congress MP Shashi Tharoor had highlighted in Parliament that numerous excavation proposals were either being not undertaken or being left incomplete.
“The ASI is undertaking exploration & excavation work based upon the potential of the site as well as problem oriented research projects covering vast time periods and vast geographical area. The expenditure on exploration and excavation as a percentage of total expenditure is not reflective of the importance given to this activity,” the then Minister of State, Culture, Mahesh Sharma said in response in the Lok Sabha.
The ASI, he said, has neither stopped the excavation work nor left it incomplete.
“Excavation needs less money in comparison to conservation work. … Excavation can only be done for a few months,” ASI joint director general (monument) Nandini Bhattacharya Sahu told ThePrint, adding that excavation is not a costly affair in India, as most of the work is done by hands not machines.
ASI’s work, she said, is not to excavate everywhere. “We excavate and explore (when it is needed).”
Conservation is a costly affair, she explained. “But the same is not true in the case of excavation. So, most of the budget goes in conservation of the monuments.”
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What CAG found
In its report, ‘Performance Audit of Preservation and Conservation of Monuments and Antiquities’, the CAG analysed the components of the ASI expenditure from 2007 to 2012.
The CAG found that 41 percent of expenditure went to conservation projects, 56 percent on the head of other-establishment, 2 percent on site museums, and 1 percent on excavation projects.
The culture ministry, it said, made budgetary allotments without assessing funds requirement and absorptive capacity. “The requirement of funds should commensurate with the number of centrally protected monuments and the need for preservation and conservation of these monuments.”
A breakdown of the numbers show how excavations never got its due over the years despite a new government coming in 2014. The ASI spent Rs 4.34 crore on excavation and exploration out of the total allocated budget of Rs 629.27 crore that year, i.e., just 0.69 percent.
That trend remained in the following years: Rs 5.48 crore (0.8 percent) in 2015, Rs 3.61 crore (0.47 percent) in 2016, Rs 5.29 crore (0.56 percent) in 2017, Rs 6.18 crore (0.64 percent) in 2018, Rs 3.56 crore (0.35 percent) in 2019, Rs 2.48 crore (0.29 percent) in 2020, Rs 5.48 crore (0.53 percent) in 2021, Rs 6.80 crore (0.6 percent) in 2022, Rs 9.98 crore (0.88 percent) in 2023, and Rs 10.03 crore (0.78 percent) in 2024.
It comes as no surprise that this fact came to the fore in 2022, when the CAG came out with a follow-up report whose audit period spans from 2013 to 2022.
The public watchdog mentioned that the culture ministry informed the Public Accounts Committee (PAC) about its decision to increase the budget on exploration/excavation activities to five percent of the total budget. “Despite the assurance given by the Ministry, ASI’s expenditure on excavation and exploration activities was still less than one percent,” it said.
Veteran archaeologist Phanikant Mishra gave a nuanced account of the ASI’s expenditures. “Monuments are fragile and they need special care. Also, many monuments are obligatory such as UNESCO heritage sites where expenditure on conservation is high. So, most of the ASI budget is spent on conservation activities,” the former ASI regional director, East, told ThePrint.
The ASI through its 5 regional and 37 circles manages conservation and management of centrally protected monuments and sites under its jurisdiction.
As for earnings, the main revenue comes from ticket sales to visitors. In 2013, the Narendra Modi government informed Parliament that the ASI earned Rs 1,804.94 crore from the centrally protected ticketed monuments in the 2013-2023 period.
On the other hand, the ASI spent Rs 3,117.87 crore, which is more than 1.5 times the revenue earned from ticket sales.
Mishra said conservation is an expensive affair but it doesn’t mean that spending on excavations should be negligible. “Excavation is the primary work of the ASI only through which we know our past. ASI needs a proper approach over it.”
ThePrint had earlier reported in July that there is no homogeneity in the allocation of funds for excavations.
Between 2020 and 2024, excavations were carried out at 58 sites across 17 states that cost Rs 34.81 crore. Of this amount, a quarter (Rs 8.53 crore) was allocated to Gujarat and over 90 percent was allocated to Modi’s hometown Vadnagar.
“In the last few years, the pace of excavations has increased. However, when it comes to spending to go up, it will take time,” Manoj Kurmi, superintending archaeologist, ASI’s Bhopal circle, told ThePrint.
The last major excavation was carried out at Sinuali, Uttar Pradesh in 2019. That excavation, according to the ASI, had unearthed a warrior tribe that once flourished around 1900 BCE.
This is an updated version of the article with statement from senior ASI official.
(Edited by Tony Rai)
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