Agreement signed to rehabilitate Lahore Fort

LAHORE:To maintain buffer zone around the Lahore Fort, Walled City of Lahore Authority (WCLA) signed a collaboration agreement with Aga Khan Culture Service Pakistan (AKCS-P).

Officials said the agreement was signed on Saturday between the two organisations for the implementation of “Heritage and Urban Regeneration: Tourism Development in Lahore Fort and its Buffer Zone”. This agreement is for five years, officials said, adding the agreement has been made to rehabilitate the surroundings of Lahore Fort and made it a tourist hub.

Under this agreement, the encroachments surrounding the heritage structure shall be removed so that the Mariam Zamani Mosque will also be visible to the tourists, which presently was covered by the encroachments. A link will be developed between the Mariam Zamani Mosque and the Lahore Fort through this project, officials said and revealed that a museum will also be established in the basement (summer palace) of Lahore Fort under this project. According to this agreement, Punjab government through WCLA entrusted AKCS-P with the missions of conceiving the project and its implementation.

The objective of the present agreement was to define the principles, terms, conditions and modalities for the implementation and operation of the project. These cover the infrastructural, socio-economic, cultural and environmental components of the Site, named as "Lahore Fort and its Buffer Zone”, in accordance with the conditions given hereafter and accepted by the parties.

Director General, WCLA, Kamran Lashari said that this collaboration agreement would cover a new phase in the rehabilitation of Lahore Fort and will help in implementation of a series of activities that will be implemented over the course of a five-year period.

“WCLA and AKCSP have carried out several successful projects in the walled city of Lahore and this will be another landmark”, he concluded.

The CEO AKCSP Tauseef Ahmad Khwaja said that through this agreement, both WCLA and AKCSP planned to formalise the framework of their collaboration for the implementation of the project.