LARKANA: The culture department and Larkana district authorities sprang into action to restrain a local landlord from going ahead with illegal digging of a portion of Moenjodaro’s protected area. However, the landlord is said to have been using his political clout to get the work resumed.

According to Moenjodaro curator Irshad Ridd, landlord Deedar Ali Behan was found executing his plan to set up a fish pond near Balhreji village located in the ‘HR area’ towards the western side of the heritage site.

A visit to the area showed that a portion of the land across a road leading to the village — hardly 600 metres away from the historical ruins excavated so far — had been dug up for the laying of the fish pond.

There were traces of heavy machinery, like excavators, having been used to prepare the ground for the fish pond near Dhandhi village. Residents of the village and sources in the culture department confirmed to Dawn that the digging work was being carried out on behalf of Mr Behan.

The curator said that he wrote to Larkana Assistant Commissioner Dr Masood Bhutto about the illegal activity at the archaeological site and sent copies of the communication to the culture secretary and director, as well as the Larkana commissioner, deputy commissioner, SSP and other relevant authorities.

Mr Ridd said such an activity was a violation of the Rules 19, 22 and 23 of the Antiquities Act,1975 and this was mentioned in the communication. He said the site was declared ‘protected’ under the Ancient Monument Protection Act, 1904.

Accordingly, he said, the culture department and the local administration intervened and got the digging work stopped with the help of police.

He said he had also sought assistance for the removal of encroachment present at the site.

Moenjodaro is spread over 555.3 gunta and 88 acres vide two revenue survey numbers 970 and 1081, respectively.

According to the sources, the archaeological site is mentioned in the old revenue record of Dokri taluka as ‘Moheen-ji-Marri’. It was revealed that in 2007, Mr Behan had allegedly encroached upon 15 acres of the site as mentioned in a letter dated Sept 28, 2007 written by the then Dokri mukhtiarkar to the assistant commissioner. The letter also mentioned three other persons occupying a seven-acre portion of the land.

Acting Culture Secretary Bashir Ahmed Brohi, speaking to the curator over the phone, obtained a complete report about the encroachment. It was learnt that the curator was facing political pressure over the issue.

Unesco has constantly been pressing the relevant authorities to undertake the dry core drilling at Moenjodaro (in order to ascertain the actual area and boundary of the archaeological site) and establish a buffer zone, which is currently kept on Unesco list of heritage sites.

Sources in the culture department said that in its last year’s meeting Unesco had warned that Moenjodaro could be struck down from its list if the boundary was not demarcated and the buffer zone not established.

Moenjodaro is the only site on world heritage list that has no defined boundary or buffer zone, according to the sources.

Published in Dawn, February 15th, 2015

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