KARACHI, Sept 23: Work on the establishment of a museum and art gallery in the State Bank of Pakistan is going on in full swing and the facility is expected to be ready in the first quarter of 2008, it has been learnt reliably.

The SBP Museum and Art Gallery is being set up in the historical stone building, originally of the State Bank of India, located next to the State Bank of Pakistan’s head office on I.I. Chundrigar Road.

The museum and the art gallery being developed at a cost of over Rs60 million under a five-year (2004-2008) project will have different sections displaying currency notes, coins, photographs and other historical objects.

The coins section will exhibit coinage from its evolution till contemporary period.

The currency section will show different stages of its development – the printing process, original and fake, security features and the properties of currency paper.

The archives and old artifacts gallery will display the archival material related to the SBP history.

The art gallery will exhibit a collection of paintings by various artists and works of Sadequain, owned by the bank. Besides, art competitions and exhibitions would be organized here.

The stamp gallery will show a collection of stamps, initially used as currency, and the transition from stamps to currency notes.

A gallery portraying the history of Pakistan and the SBP through documents, photographs, audio discs and virtual tours will be set up under the title of History of Pakistan.

A conservation lab will be established for preservation and treatment of objects and antiquities displayed in the museum. A modelling section to make replicas, gift items, and souvenirs for the visitors will also be a part of the facility.

Originally a smaller Archive and Numismatic Museum, established in early 1980s on the initiative of the then SBP governor S. A. Hasnie, had been functioning in the bank’s library located in the bank’s head office. However, owing to the reconstruction and renovation of the building it was dismantled five years back in 2002. Later, the former governor Ishrat Hussain decided to establish a larger monetary museum and art gallery in the next door colonial style building which once used to house the State Bank of India.

Museum and Art Gallery project chief Dr Asma Ibrahim said such facilities were functioning in almost every country and the department would seek membership of the International Committee for Money and Banking Museums to keep this museum at par with other monetary museums of the world.