Landscape conservation and restoration of historic gardens of Pakistan: case study of three Mughal Gardens

Abstract

Historic Mughal gardens of Pakistan along with their contents are an important part of its national heritage. The Mughals are claimed to be the first to introduce the formal garden design to Indio-Pak sub-continent. Many changes have occurred overtime in the landscape of these gardens. This situation necessitates the need to restore and conserve the original landscape of these gardens. In this regard present research study had been proposed to be carried out on three purposively selected Mughal gardens namely Shalamar Garden, Tomb of Jahangir and Wah Garden where original landscape plants were searched out through available documentary records, and a list of present plants was prepared and documented. The perceptions of visitors and the information-rich persons were recorded and analyzed for inferring the results. The scanty documentary records and the absence of any landscape plan of these gardens imposed major difficulties in finding out the complete list of original plants. Many factors were found contributing towards the deterioration and destruction of landscape of these historic gardens. These included time factor, invasion of armies, neglect and carelessness, changing government policies, temporality of plant material, insufficient documentary records, and political and communal influence of residents. It was also observed that new plant varieties were being introduced in the landscape of these historic gardens which was a deviation from originality. Lack of consistent policies of the concerned department, lack of sufficient funds and technical staff and the changing priorities of the changing governments were the main reasons of unsatisfactory landscape conservation and restoration work of these gardens. Majority of the visitors expressed their wish to see the original landscape plants of these gardens. The respondents suggested various measures to increase the income of the department for proper landscape conservation and restoration. The major measures suggested by the respondents were an increase in the amount of entry ticket and imposing small tax on exports and imports. In the light of the findings of present study it is recommended that landscape conservation and restoration of these historic gardens should be carried out on scientific bases by following the international charters so that this valuable heritage asset could be saved from the threats mentioned above.