‘No chemical used on Kotla pillar’

NEW DELHI: The Archaeological Survey of India (ASI) has denied any chemical treatment of the Ashokan pillar at Ferozeshah Kotla in the past 20 years. Officers of its science department, based in Dehradun, are likely to visit the site next week to start a full-scale investigation to determine the reasons behind the flaking and deterioration of the pillar.
After preliminary investigations, ASI has said the decay might have been caused by air pollution and exposure to the nature.“This couldn’t have happened in a short time. It would have been evolving over decades and then got accelerated for some reason. Once the investigation is over, we will plan its structural conservation and stabilise the existing inscriptions on a priority basis,” said ASI director (science branch) V K Saxena.
In the past 20 years or so, ASI has only “done scientific cleaning and preservation. The quality of the stone is such that we try to monitor them as much as possible despite having limited staff,” he said, ruling out any possibility of the inscriptions getting damaged by chemicals.
The science branch, set up in 1917, primarily looks after chemical treatment and preservation of museum exhibits and the antiquities under national protection. It also studies causes of any deterioration for better preservation.
Sources in the culture ministry said it was critical to know if the flaking was a recent phenomenon or developed over time. “In any case, ASI should have been noticed the decay so that the inscriptions could have been saved in entirety,” said an official.
ASI is reported to be toying with the idea of a protective cover over the pillar. “The option will be explored if the investigations point at environmental factors,” said a source.