Restoration: Crumbling walls at Shah Rukn-i-Alam need repair

The building is being damaged by water leaking from two ablution points.

MULTAN:

The Auqaf Department secretary and the Multan commissioner on Friday took notice of cracks in the walls of Shah Rukn-i-Alam’s mausoleum in Multan.

The Archaeology Department has warned that water leaking from two ablution points at the 680-year-old site is damaging it.

Archaeology Department SDO Malik Ghulam Muhammad said the east-north portion of the building’s wall, near an ablution point (wuzu khana), had been affected.

“An ablution point at the mausoleum was closed a few days ago...another attached to the east-north corner closed six months ago,” he said.



Auqaf Department Zonal Administrator Mehmoodul Hassan said the secretary, Auqaf Department Chief Administrator Saqib Aziz and Auqaf Estate Director Tariq Zaman had visited the mausoleum on Friday and inspected it.

He said the water had also damaged a 100-foot portion of the boundary wall. “The Auqaf Department had rebuilt the wall in December 2012 at a cost of Rs2.7 million,” he said.

Hassan said the two ablution points would remain closed.

He said the commissioner had asked Finance EDO Chaudhry Aslam to look into the matter.

He said Archaeology Department SDO and Auqaf Department officials were to hold a meeting with Gardens Director Farooq Dogar on Monday to devise a strategy to repair and strengthen the mausoleum’s affected portions.

Published in The Express Tribune, October 13^th, 2013.