It has happened three times in the last four years. Every time the ‘authorities’ claim a scientific conservation solution has been applied and the historic walls of the Lahore Fort will not now fall. Last week they did again.

What is going on? The Lahore Fort is a Unesco-conserved historic monument, and a rare Mughal-era monument, probably the finest in Lahore if not the sub-continent. There are other amazing monuments in the city too, but nothing to match the collective monuments in one place. The problem is that this ancient place, whose walls encompass almost 4,500 years of known antiquity is the least secure of any structures in the now expanded city of over 12 million humans.

Last week the northern walls collapsed for the second time in 14 months. Experts inform that just because the monument does not have a secure drainage system, rainwater collects inside the massive walls. Over time these ancient structures give way. To imagine that this is a recent phenomenon is not far from the truth. So let us see what is the problem?

Ever since the fort was handed over to the Walled City of Lahore Authority (WCLA) three years ago, they faced a massive funding and expertise problem, let alone a management one. Here was probably the country’s largest and finest collection of ancient monuments and no funds were allocated for repair and maintenance to save the ongoing salaries of the old staff.

In British days the Archaeology Department handled matters. Come Pakistan the same arrangement continued, only that it kept changing hands between central and provincial control. In the end the bureaucrats decided that it was best handed over to the WCLA, which was a decentralised authority handling the old walled city only. They neither had the understanding or competence of what the Lahore Fort meant or needed.

This remains the case today. Instead of handing over repair and conservation to experts in historic conservation based on Unesco principles, petty building contractors are given the job. It goes without saying that it is almost like asking a novice the job of repairing an aircraft. But without going into the details of the financial aspects of this ‘repair and maintenance’ undertakings, let us understand what is happening.

Inside the fort over the centuries a very ingenious and intricate drainage system brought water to huge outlets from all over the fort. At no stage did water collect, or stand to seep underground, but kept moving on towards an outlet. This made sure not a single structure was ever endangered.

But then for the first time we see that the famed Sheesh Mahal’s roof started to cave in. A foreign government stepped in to save this structure. The problem was that no in-house skill existed. This was also a reason that control over the fort was being thrown from one department to another. No one wanted it.

Come 2008 and the Aga Khan stepped in to demonstrate just how beautiful old Lahore can be if an effort is made. They conserved Gali Surjan Singh inside |Delhi Gate. It was, and remains, a marvel worth visiting. The end result was that in 2012 the WCLA was set up. The Aga Khan Centre then took on the Shahi Hammam project under the WCLA. It has been an amazing conservation project. The skill shows.

But two years ago the Punjab Government handed over the Lahore Fort to a completely unprepared WCLA, and all this without adequate funding. What one learns is that repair work is being handed out to ‘lowest bidder’ contractors, almost all without the adequate skill to handle a project as sensitive and important as the Lahore Fort.

As other smaller projects were being undertaken, all of which have drainage aspects to them, as all construction does, one sees the drains heading in the opposite direction than the natural flow. A well-known Lahore architect who understands these problems informs: “The work is a disaster”.

So what is happening is that as most monuments are placed on the northern side of the Lahore Fort, the water drains towards the northern walls, which with a lot of obstructions sees the water seep inside the walls. For this reason “every year a portion of the wall collapses”. It did so in a huge way last year, and again this year it has collapsed. Thankfully our newspaper published a photograph of the collapse on Thursday last, and the picture clearly shows slight curved along the way.

The wall collapse last year opened up the chance to explore and investigate the basement area, with several layers of limestone construction becoming visible because of the fall. Back in 2018 the Lahore Fort started experiencing ‘drainage problems’ when a new ‘modern’ water disposal plan was planned. They described it as ‘modernisation’, despite the warning that “a contractor’s view was getting precedence over academically rigorous conservation rules”. We all know that water flows according to gravity.

So as the north-eastern side of the fort was the portion where the new water flow was heading towards, it did not cater to the possibility of an overflow. The old traditional system headed out to ‘disposal points’ that protruded out of the walls. So when the new system headed middle or southwards, what was forgotten was that in the case of an overflow in the old system, the dug-up portion had to be compacted properly. What was done was that loose earth was not properly compacted. This year that error came forth.

So over time as water filled up the space between the old Mughal-era wall and the inner mud loosely-compacted filling, naturally a gap started opening up. The WCLA was informed of a ‘pending probable problem’. A report was then shelved, and shelved it remains. Slowly and steadily the wall gap widened and then one day the ancient south-eastern portion collapsed. Still no lesson was learnt. Come 2023 it has happened again. The report remains shelved.

We understand that after a French grant the Akbari Gate and other eastern portions are being conserved, and they will take at least four years, which is what serious conservation work takes. Just for the record the northern wall collapse will be completed by the contractors within ten to 15 days. No other historic monument is ‘repaired’ in such record time.

There is a reason for this. Serious conservation means first tackling the underlying problem, so that a collapse does not recur. There is no such consideration in the contractor’s books for repairing the Lahore Fort walls. Our government and rulers of ever ilk have no such worries. So it will be more of the same. It is probably time that a specialised organisation be set up to handle the Lahore Fort alone, and to let the WCLA continue with their important work. Let’s see what happens.

Published in Dawn, April 16th, 2023