Shed slavish mindset, shift British-era Yale Tomb out of court premises: Madras High Court tells ASI

The Madras High Court has directed the Archaeological Survey of India (ASI) to shift Hynmers’ Obelisk, a historic colonial era tomb, out of the Court campus. .The structure, also known as the Yale Tomb, houses the graves of David Yale, son of former Madras Governor Elihu Yale, and one of his close friends, Joseph Hymners..Justice M Dhandapani said that the tomb, which was built around 320 years ago to mark the burial spots of Hynmers and Yale, had neither archaeological value nor any artistic value. It continued to be a protected monument merely because it was built by the British and fell in the mechanical category of protected structures that were built over 100 years ago."Merely because the tomb has been in existence for more than 100 years, that alone cannot be a ground to declare the monument as a protected monument, thereby bringing it under the cover of ancient monument as provided for under Section 2 (a) of the Act," the order said..The Court directed the ASI to shift the graves elsewhere and to relocate the tomb so that the land on which the structure stands can be used for other purposes. .The observations were made in a plea by lawyer B Manoharan claiming that the Central government, though empowered to denotify an ancient monument which had ceased to be of national importance, had failed to apply its mind to the said structure. He argued that his representation sent to the ASI to relocate the tomb to make way for a much needed parking lot within the court complex had been rejected without any application of mind..The Court said that after going through the pictures of the said structure, it agreed that it had no extraordinary architectural or aesthetic value that needed to be preserved.Justice Dhandapani further said that the ASI must "first divest its slavish mindset carried on from the colonial era.""An order passed by the British regime in the year 1921 has been allowed to continue for more than a century, unmindful of its monument’s value archaeologically or historically. Merely because the British rulers, then, had passed an order declaring the tomb as a protected monument, upon Independence, it is not necessary that independent India should continue what the British regime had thought fit to do then. May be, the slavery attitude, which marked the colonial era during the British regime, has not faded from the memory of the authority..."The judge thus directed the ASI and other Central government authorities to "take steps to relocate the tomb to any appropriate place," within four weeks of its order..Advocate S Sivashanmugam appeared for the petitioner.Deputy Solicitor General R Rajesh Vivekananthan appeared for the respondents, the Union Ministry of Culture and the ASI..[Read Order]