INDORE: As a first step for the heritage property Mandu to be included in the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization’s ( UNESCO ) World Heritage list, Dhar administration submitted a nomination dossier to the state tourism board which was unveiled by state tourism minister Surendra Singh Baghel on Wednesday.

The dossier consists of the iconic heritage property’s legacy portrayed in about 2000 pages and 200 images.

“We initiated the process and there are some guidelines prescribed by the UNESCO which we followed and completed the dossier in a record time of six months. We have submitted the dossier to the minister today and a team will be presenting the proposal to the state tourism board and if convinced, they will forward it to the Government of India,” Dhar district collector Shrikant Bhanot told TOI.

In the next step, the state government would then be forwarding the dossier to the ministry of culture, from where it will be sent to International Conference on Operations Management and Operations Research (ICOMOR), the advisory body of UNESCO.

“The entire evaluation, beginning from the state tourism board, will take place in 15 months. They will then generate a report to the ministry of culture stating if they are directly adding it to the list or any other requirement to be fulfilled. As per UNESCO, the year starts from September 30 and it will be declared by 2020-21 slot or by 2021-22 slot,” said an Indore-based consultation company’s planning and designing department head, Garima Rajput.

The dossier is an inclusive effort to preserve both tangible and intangible cultural heritage of the town in the form of rich tribal culture, art, skills, festivals, cuisine, environment, fauna, rains and language. It also focuses on national and international tourism enhancement that strengthens the backbone of economic activities in the town, which further generates year-round employment activities for its inhabitants, she said.

