MULTAN: The story of establishing a museum in Clock Tower began in 2008. The project to be completed in three years is still under way.

District Coordination Officer (DCO) Zahid Saleem Gondal recently visited the Clock Tower building and vowed to complete the project, saying the government had released Rs8 million to the Provincial Archeology Department for the museum.

Official files tell a long story of lethargy and broken promises, now all part of history.

The provincial assembly approved the project in the 2008-09 budget but the work began in 2009 because the allocations – Rs5 million – were not released. The Punjab Archeology Department began converting the upper portion of the Clock Tower building into a museum in 2009. In 2008, Archeology Department Director Shahbaz Khan declared the building unsuitable for the museum while his successor, Dr Syed Pervez Abbas, visited the Clock Tower and recommended the place for museum.

The commissioner, who is authorised to approve schemes up to Rs100 million, approved the project in April 2008 only to be turned down by the Finance Department that only the Archeology Department secretary could issue the approval.

By the time the then information, culture and youth affairs secretary Shoaib bin Aziz approved the scheme, funds had lapsed.

In 2009-10, the Punjab government released Rs20 million, of which only Rs15 million were spent to renovate the building. In 2010-11, Rs8 million were released for the remaining renovation work, purchase of antiques, air-conditions, multimedia, walkthrough gates and books.

In 2011-12, the Punjab government focused only on Lahore and did not release even a single penny while in 2012-13 Rs8 million were released to buy showcases, antiques and for boundary wall.

The wall was removed on the direction of the then DCO Nasim Sadiq for the smooth flow of traffic in 2012.

In 2013, the museum to-be became a library when the Municipal Public Library was shifted to Clock Tower. As the library is under construction at the fort, the Clock Tower serves the book readers.

When the boundary wall was razed, the Archeology Department declared the building unsuitable for the museum citing security and dust pollution reasons.

The Clock Tower was built in 1884 for municipal offices and became town hall.

The Town Hall has been a centre of literary and cultural activities for decades. Intellectual Mazhar Arif said Makhdoom Sajjad Husain Qureshi, during his governorship of the province in the 80s, had proposed a museum in the city. He said the important task was to gather historical and cultural treasures of Multan.

DCO Gondal said antiques worth Rs1.5 million had been bought for the museum and more would be arranged from the museums of Lahore Fort, Harappa and Texila.

He said land would be acquired for parking and boundary wall at the museum place.

He said the library would be shifted to its historical building after renovating it while separate study boxes would also be constructed in the main hall of the library.

Punjab Archeology Department in charge Malik Ghulam Muhammad said work on the project could begin after revising estimates if the building was handed over to the department.