Implementation Action Team: Cultural Heritage Promoting Quality of Life and Sustainable Development in the At-Risk Megacity Periphery of Kolkata

实施行动小组(IAT)的目标地区是印度西孟加拉邦胡里河畔的城市。他们的许多建筑遗产的独特价值可以追溯到欧洲的贸易和防御工事(法国人从17世纪70年代开始在钱丹纳加，丹麦人从17世纪50年代开始将塞兰波尔城市化，巴拉克波尔是英国人在17世纪70年代开发的)。在19世纪，向欧洲人供货致富的印度商人和商人建造了非常原创的混合风格的宏伟住宅：他们的帕拉迪亚风格的立面反映了欧洲人建造的公共建筑，但他们与世隔绝的内部庭院适应了气候、多户人家的居住和印度教的虔诚习俗。这一丰富的建筑遗产以及由此产生的混合文化遗产在饮食文化、音乐传统、语言变异等方面的重要性，促使英国遗产保护历史学家菲利普·戴维斯在2015年评论说，胡里河不仅是一条印度河流，而且是世界的。与印度其他邦相比，西孟加拉邦的许多标准发展标志都低于中位数，遗产和旅游部门的状况反映了这一点。例如，第一家面向海外游客的酒店2018年才在塞兰波尔开业。然而，1991年开始的印度经济自由化导致胡里走廊遭受了压倒性的、加速的城市化，人口密度不断增加，但这股所谓的开发浪潮将国内建筑遗产置于极端危险之中。开发商的当务之急是，其河水环境和良好的通勤铁路连接，使胡里走廊成为加尔各答特大城市理想的郊区宿舍。2011年人口普查显示，加尔各答有1403万人口。因此，胡里走廊独特的卖点也将其置于最高风险之中。在没有任何可执行的规划法和建筑控制的情况下，数百处遗产物业被拆除，取而代之的是三层、可识别的混凝土公寓。IAT的合作伙伴西孟加拉邦遗产委员会和塞兰波尔倡议都做了重要的工作，列出并翻新了七座公共建筑，但IAT将财富创造、翻新、教育、福祉和纪录片路径混合在一起，将向西孟加拉邦政府展示一套多样化的工具，以投资资源来保护和发展该地区的文化和建筑遗产，以免为时已晚。至关重要的是，IAT将通过其前身胡里河文化项目(HRCP)赢得并提高遗产事业技能的人员和组织来做到这一点。前身AHRC-ICHR资助的呼利河文化项目记录了遗产资产，并使许多人了解这条河是如何将他们连接起来的，但IAT的路径活动将使选定的关键个人在2020年更加活跃。这些人将不再只是遗产知识的见证者和共同创造者，他们将更上一层楼，将IAT的工具应用于建筑和文化遗产，并以可持续的方式为自己创造财富和福祉。2021年1月结束时，实施行动小组(IAT)将展示来自不同社会经济群体的西孟加拉邦在其邦创建自下而上的遗产基础设施方面可以拥有的新机构(人口9880万，2018年)，从而标志着从压倒性的自上而下、文化精英主义和(相当不幸的)肤浅的努力到目前为止官方干预(而不是WBHC)的根本和亟需的改变。只有在积极的干预和熟练的当地人的帮助下，才能采取有效的行动来解决目前由城市扩张造成的遗产危机，并使这个地势低洼的地区为应对气候变化做好准备。

The areas targeted by the Implementation Action Team (IAT) are cities on the banks of Hugli River in West Bengal, India. The origins of the unique value of much of their built heritage can be traced back to European trading and fortification (the French in Chandannagar from the 1670s, the Danes urbanizing Serampore from the 1750s and Barrackpore being developed by the British in the 1770s). During the nineteenth century, Indian merchants and traders who enriched themselves supplying the Europeans had grand residences built in a highly original hybrid style: their Palladian facades mirrored the public buildings built by the Europeans, but their cloistered inner courtyards were geared to the climate, multiple family occupancy and to Hindu devotional practice. The importance of this wealth of built heritage and the hybrid cultural heritage that has sprung from it in terms of food cultures, musical traditions, language variation etc, led the UK historian of heritage conservation Philip Davies to comment in 2015 that the Hugli 'is not just an Indian river but belongs to the world'. The state of West Bengal lies below the median in terms of many of the standard development markers when compared against other Indian states and the state of the heritage and tourism sectors reflect this. For example, the first hotel for overseas visitors opened in Serampore only in 2018. The economic liberalization of India starting in 1991, however, has led to the Hugli Corridor being subjected to overwhelming and accelerating urbanization increasing the population density, but this wave of so-called development has put domestic built heritage at extreme risk. The developers' imperative is that its riverine environment and excellent commuter rail links make the Hugli Corridor the ideal suburban dormitory pendant to the megacity of Kolkata (population 14.03M in the 2011 census). The Hugli Corridor's Unique Selling Point, therefore, also places it at the highest risk. In the absence of any enforceable planning law and building control, hundreds of heritage properties have been demolished and replaced by three-storey, identikit, concrete flats. IAT's partners, the West Bengal Heritage Commission and the Serampore Initiative have both done important work, listing and renovating seven public buildings, but the IAT's blended mix of wealth-creation, renovation, education, well-being and documentary film pathways will show the West Bengal state government a diverse toolkit of ways to invest resources to preserve and develop the region's cultural and built heritage before it is too late. Crucially, the IAT will do this through the people and organisations that its predecessor project, the Hugli River of Cultures Project (HRCP), won and up-skilled for the cause of heritage. The predecessor AHRC-ICHR funded Hugli River of Cultures Project documented heritage assets and sensitized large numbers of people into how the river connects them, but the IAT's pathway activities will make selected key individuals even more active throughout 2020. Those individuals will no longer be only witnesses and co-creators of heritage knowledge, they will move up to the next level and apply the IAT's tools to built and cultural heritage and used both to create wealth and well-being for themselves in a sustainable manner. When in ends in January 2021, the Implementation Action Team (IAT) will show the new agency that West Bengalis from diverse socio-economic groups can have in creating bottom-up heritage infrastructure in their state (pop 98.8M, 2018), thus marking a radical and much-needed change of course from the overwhelming top-down, culturally elitist and (rather unfortunate) superficial efforts that have characterized official interventions to date (not WBHC). It is only with active intervention and skilled local people that effective action can be taken to address the present heritage emergency caused by urban sprawl and to prepare this low-lying region for climate change