Paharpur Declaration

The Indian delegates was led by Mr.Goutam Ghose and the Dhaka delegates by Mr.Pijush Banerjee. The moderator for the Paharpur workshop was Mr.Shekhar Das and the Chief Guest was Mr.Safiqul Islam, DG-Archaeology. Dr.Nazmanara Khanum, the DC of Naogaon District was the Special Guest of the occasion. The workshop was opened by the film ‘Beyond Barriers’, a film by Ajoy Roy. The welcome address was made by Taufiq Rahman and the ground for the workshop was presented through a guideline explained by Raj Basu. The organizing part of the workshop and the Joypurhat hospitality was made successful by Shah Fakir Md. Rafiqul Islam Chowdhury Prince and Apurba Sarkar. Almost all delegates participated in the workshop and their inputs were noted as a part of the ‘Paharpur Declaration’. The points of ‘Paharpur Declaration’ and the delegates present were:
1. Tourism, peace and heritage conservation approach in cross-border initiatives.
2. Connectivity & Good roads connecting sites of Naogaon and Joypurhat Districts.
3. Basic tourist facilities like toilet complex, restaurant etc.
4. Interpretation and Guide facility at the sites, English speaking guides.
5. Highlight all heritage sites in a systematic way.
6. Sightseeing taxi facility at Joypurhat as this is important terminal for tourists.
7. Link Paharpur with Nalanda site.
8. Utilise other acquired lands in Paharpur for development purposes which helps locally.
9. Local employment opportunity through the Heritage sites for poverty alleviation. Local capacity development priority.
10. Impact analysis of tourism on the heritage sites and the management plan should address core and buffer areas.
11. Conservation master plan with local, district, national and cross border international levels.
12. Archeological department should identify a proper consultant to help the master plan.
13. Paharpur as the nucleus of the heritage cicuit of Bangladesh North Bengal.
14. Local committes or units at every heritage site for tourism to start with this initiative.
15. Ease the political boundaries between the two North Bengals as there was not so much restrictions before.
16. Safety and security of tourists/visitors.
17. Bangladesh to make easy visa facility for foreign tourists.
18. Local tourists of Bangladesh must visit their home sites.
19. Proper display of time and distance between the several sites.
20. Joypurhat to be promoted as the tourism base for visitors to Paharpur.
21. Establish A Regional Government Tourism office at Joypurhat for promoting and information about the sites of the region.
22. Awareness of local heritage sites at the local schools and at all public level.
23. Nogaon and Joypurhat to Prepare Hilli as a tourism facility site.
24. Picnickers mainly come as visitors and crosses a lakh, but the real tourists are negligible.
25. Longer stay at Paharpur for atleast 06 hours and develop the tourism product accordingly.
26. Local awareness among the people of Paharpur.
27. Promote Muktijodha base of Paharpur.
28. Foreign currency exchange facility.
29. Local culture team for tourism activity addition.
30. Government to be a good facilitator, business opportunity for the local people.
31. More trains between Hiili/Balurghat and Njp and better trains from Dhaka to Joypurhat, both for tourism.
32. Promote Paharpur through television medium and Government to promote mainly in Japan through advertisement to increase number of domestic and international tourists.
33. Archeological department to please confirm protection of all the heritage sites. Local awareness and participation in heritage conservation.
34. Include Heritage Tourism as subject in schools of Bangladesh.
35. International but regional level cultural exchange between Bangladesh and India.
36. India should have a tourism office in the Hilli/Balurghat area.
37. Visitor interpretetion centre at Paharpur.
38. Establish a network as ‘Paharpur Bandhu’ or ‘Friends of Paharpur’ with today’s members on a email base.
39. The project on tourism infrastructure has begun at Paharpur by tourism department.
40. 15 million ADB fund received and a part will be used for community based tourism as 1992 resolution.
41. No presence of the heritage sites with Paharpur present on the internet and hence a site to be launched with Paharpur.
42. The intercity train stoppage at Jamalpur Railway station.
43. Tourism Guide Association of Bangladesh will help in local guide training.
44. Local homestays to be promoted at priority basis and every household to be involved with good toilet facilities.
45. Moonlit Paharpur than can be promoted as product.
46. Bangladesh Travel Writers Association will help in publications on print and net.
47. Local people to take the responsibility to conserve the sites and the Government to help such initiatives.
48. Free and publications for sale of good quality should be available.
49. Promote Rabindranath Tagore’s Yatra and consider visitors as Tirtha Yatri to connect people.
50. Establish a helipad at Paharpur for tourists.
51. Reestablish the train route through Hardings Bridge, via Joypurhat between Calcutta to Darjeeling.
52. Department of Archaeology will help tourism but it should be kept in mind that no damage can be done to any site for tourism development.
53. Tourism has to be the growth engine in Bangladesh to be taken as a policy.
54. DC Madam, Nagaon has confirmed the participation in joint development of cross border tourism with adjoining North Bengal of India.
55. This initiative has increased people to people relation as said by DG Archaeology between Government, local people, visitors from Dhaka and visitors from India.
56. Trust and confidence building has to follow from this workshop in heritage tourism development and cross-border relation development by the present Government.
57. Tourism is a common demand in Bangladesh today and the Government is giving priority.
58. Host family culture exists in Bangladesh but this has to be nurtured and developed for the upcoming generation.
59. Schools have already been involved in educational tours to Paharpur and this will be made more elaborate in future.
60. Light and Sound show for Paharpur, which should include the days of Mahasthangarh.
For more details
Visit: http://www.viewsontourism.info/2010/paharpur-world-heritage-site-and-wtd-yatra-2010/

Paharpur, World Heritage Site, Bangladesh

Connecting World Heritage Sites through people’s participation between the two North Bengals of Bangladesh & India through tourism to confirm conservation of heritage and peace.


Help Tourism, initiated local community participation through tourism in another UNESCO declared World Heritage Site, PAHARPUR and their first site in Bangladesh with the assistance of Biplab Saha, the CEO of Sun Tourism and Taifiq Rahman, 1st Vice President of Tour Operators Association of Bangladesh (TOAB).



The first survey of the World Heritage Sites in Bangladesh was undertaken by Help Tourism in the year 2001. February 2009, one of the master degree ecotourism intern from University of Applied Science - Eberswalde/ Germany, Sascha Prinz from Help Tourism visited the Paharpur site and gave his inputs. After that, the meeting in TTF Kolkata in July, 2009 with the tourism industry of Bangladesh and the Bangladesh Consulate at Kolkata raised hope that this was the right time to work on ‘people’s involvement in tourism’ and create the first model for Bangladesh.



Accordingly, the trip to Paharpur was undertaken between 9th to 11th September, 2009 by Raj Basu and Biplab Saha. The route taken from Siliguri was Chengrabandha, Burimari, Teesta Barrage, Rangpur and Joypurhat. Joypurhat being 10 kms from Paharpur, the nearest urban area with available logistics, we chose this as the base. The other reasons for choosing Joypurhat was the other National heritage interests being close by, easy road and rail connectivity and motivated people with good network at the nearby Bangladesh-India border.



The major interest is that Paharpur is a World Heritage Site, and we explained locally that 1) such a heritage confirms and enlightens the development of the communities who lived here, 2) and keeping aside our class, creed & religion, we must all be proud of it and bring back the old glory. 3) We further explained that tourism is the only window that opens to the world and we look forward to their involvement in tourism. 4) This will create wonderful easy land connectivity between the World Heritage Sites: from Darjeeling to Paharpur to Dhaka, uniting the two North Bengals. 5) This will help in cross-border relations and peace.



As the lonelyplanet.com mentions in its description very rightly, except the approach (getting to Paharpur) which is now quite easy:

The Somapuri Vihara at Paharpur was once the biggest Buddhist monastery south of the Himalaya. It dates from the 8th century AD. This is the most impressive archaeological site in Bangladesh; it was declared a protected archaeological site back in 1919, although the scholar-traveller Dr Buckman Hamilton had shown interest in it as far back as 1807. The name of the site has changed over the eons; it began life as Somapura (abode of the moon), then became Mahavihara (greatest monastery) before taking its current combination name. Getting to Paharpur is a bit of a pain on public transport, but it all adds to the element of discovery.



On the evening of 9th, we visited the Paharpur site. It was dark and person living near the site, he offered us his house to stay. The people near the site suggested that we go to Joypurhat and spend the night there. We put up at the Hotel Prithbi at the Thana Road in Joypurhat, where we were met by the Joypurhat Municipality Panel Mayor, Mr.Nandalal Parchi and his team. We had a long discussion, after which he was convinced that our concept for community involvement in Paharpur and adjoining places of interest will go a long way towards sustainable development of the entire area. He insisted that the next day, we should visit the Paharpur site and a few places of interest with his people.



On 10th morning we first visited Paharpur and surveyed the whole site, after which we met the Custodian, Md.Abdul Latif Pk at the Paharpur Museum. He discussed several points like the encroachment of the site by the local people through their activities in jute processing in the wetlands, cattle grazing, stealing of bricks etc. There are on an average 500 people illegally entering the site everyday. The other problem is about the salinity in the atmosphere and maintenance is tough. There is only one pump and it is difficult to avoid water logging in the monsoons. Guide engagement has not been possible. There is a lack of proper audio-visual material and equipment. Practical archaeological deficiency has left a lot of archaeological site Goalvita, Dhamurhat etc in distress. The practical orientation in the tourism industry is missing and hence proper interpretation has not been possible.



We were accompanied by Mr.Ashok Kumar Sarkar (Gaur) & Mr.Mrinal Kanti Sarkar (Minu) of Joypurhat. We visited some of the other places of interest like Baro Shiv, Sugar Mill etc. The other places are Mahasthal, Akkelpur and pagla Dewan. Everyone told us that we must visit Dhamurhat, Jagdalvihar and Patharghata, the description of which will be found in the book by Mr.Rakhal Das Bandhopadhyay. Every year at Hille border in India a festival is organized in respect of the Indian army, who have laid their lives in the Bangla Independence War. Also Mr.Dhananjay Rai of Kaliaganj has also written a lot on the heritage of this area. The other personalities who have an elaborate knowledge about this area are Mr.Shyamal Bhattacharya, ex-Headmaster of Bagora School, Dr.Martuja Khaled (Dipu), Islamic History Department of Rajsahi University and Mr.Samar Pal who is now a senior Secretary at Dhaka.



In the evening, we had an elaborate meeting of local personalities and NGOs presided by Mr.Aminul Haque Babul at Phulki and attended by Ad.Nanda Kishore Agarwala, Mr.Tapan Kumar Khan, Mr.Ranjao Kumar Kundu, Mr.Tapan Kumar Mahanta, Mr.Niresh from Rangpur, Mr.Apurba Sarkar, Md.Motinur Rahman, Mr.Sujan Kumar Mondal, Md.Monsur Rahman, Mr.Azizar Rahman and Mr.Gholam Haqkani.



The discussions led to the following conclusions and appreciations,

1) That this area has a reputation of terrorism and tourism will help to built good reputation and livelihood and hopes for the area.

2) Tourism will attract the confidence of Dhaka, as the circuit that is being planned is Dhaka-Paharpur-Darjeeling.

3) That good NGO infrastructure is available even to accommodate tourists.

4) That the area has good NGO capacity and good work reputation with the villages of the area.

5) It is possible to develop Homestays, several of them had good access to the private residential houses in Joypurhat through the initiative of developing the biggest infrastructure of Home Libraries in Bangladesh.

6) Also there is an opportunity to develop different kinds of Handicrafts and Handlooms.

7) One of the biggest difficulties is that Jotpurhat and the Paharpur site are in two different districts and have two different political parties in power, but the biggest advantage is that they have same linguistic accent and culture, and the two districts with the political have very good relations locally.

8) There is a wonderful Adibashi (tribal) area with rich culture.

9) That we must have a Paharpur Festival every year.

10) Organize a big Bangladesh-India meeting in the Raiganj/Kaliaganj/Balurghat area in this winter.



The meeting was coordinated by Mr.Nandalal Parchi and he was selected to lead the initiative of Connecting World Heritage Sites and developing Cross-Border Tourism with special reference to Paharpur in Bangladesh.