 | |
| Abbreviation | YfHF |
|---|---|
| Formation | 26 January 2014 |
| Founder | Vikramjit Singh Rooprai |
| Type | NGO |
| Purpose | Heritage Awareness and Promotion |
| Headquarters | New Delhi |
| Website | Youth for Heritage Foundation |
The Youth for Heritage Foundation is a non-profit non-governmental organization registered under the Societies Registration Act, 1860. It was started as a hobby project in October 2009 and became popular over time.
In October 2009, Vikramjit Singh Rooprai, an information technology consultant and social media guru went on a personal sightseeing trip to monuments in Delhi. He found many sites, for which, there was no reference available online. He launched a project named Didar-i-Dilli and started gathering information about Delhi's heritage. The information was made public via his website monumentsofdelhi.com later that year. [1]
Vikramjit Singh Rooprai is a heritage activist and educationist. He is better known as the founder of India's largest Heritage-Hobby club, the Heritage Photography Club and Youth for Heritage Foundation. Vikramjit started his career as a digital marketing consultant and later turned into an educationist.
In October 2010, Vikramjit formed an online club named Delhi Heritage Awareness Club. This club started heritage walks with a small group of people. Upon suggestions from members, the club was renamed The Heritage Photography Club. In less than 7 years, they had 21,000 members on Facebook and became one of the largest repository of photographs of monuments from across India.
In 2013, the Heritage Photography Club started organizing heritage talks at monuments. These talks were branded Heritage Durbars. Initially, these durbars (sessions) were held at various monuments in Delhi. In 2014, the club was invited by India Habitat Centre to conduct these sessions at one of their auditoriums. In 2014, the body was registered under the Societies Registration Act as Youth for Heritage Foundation. Rooprai was the founding chairman.
The India Habitat Centre is a multipurpose building in New Delhi, India. Mixing work, commercial and social spaces, the Indian Habitat Centre is one of India’s most comprehensive convention centres.
Youth for Heritage Foundation is involved in heritage promotion and awareness by educational institutions, corporations, and individuals.
The largest arm of Youth for Heritage Foundation is the Delhi Heritage Photography Club. [2] In December 2016, the club was renamed The Heritage Photography Club. Regular heritage photo-walks are organized at monuments across India. The focus remains on educating people about the lesser known aspects, architecture and history of the sites. [3]
Youth for Heritage Foundation started Heritage Talks in 2013. First talk was held at Zafar Mahal in Mehrauli on Sufism. Since 2014, these talks are being organized in Casuarina and Gulmohar Hall of India Habitat Centre. Every month, a new speaker is identified and a new topic is presented to audience. Personalities like Pushpesh Pant, KK Muhammed, Raza Rumi, Feisal Alkazi, Sohail Hashmi, R.V. Smith, Dr. Sharif Hussain Qasemi and D. N. Chaudhuri have spoken through this platform. [4]
Zafar Mahal, in Mehrauli village, in South Delhi, India is considered the last monumental structure built as a summer palace during the fading years of the Mughal era. The building has two components namely, the Mahal or the palace, which was built first by Akbar Shah II in the 18th century, and the entrance gate that was reconstructed in the 19th century by Bahadur Shah Zafar II, popularly known as "Zafar" meaning ‘Victory’. It has a forlorn history because Bahadur Shah Zafar, who wished to be buried in the precincts of the Zafar Mahal (palace) and the famous Dargah of Khwaja Qutubuddin Bakhtiar Kaki in Mehrauli, Delhi, was deported by the British to Rangoon, after the First War of Indian Independence in 1857, where he died of old age without any honour.
Mehrauli is a neighbourhood in the South West district of Delhi in India. It represents a constituency in the legislative assembly of Delhi. The area is located close to Gurgaon and next to Vasant Kunj. Naresh Yadav of Aam Aadmi Party is the current MLA from Mehrauli.
Sufism, or Taṣawwuf,, variously defined as "Islamic mysticism", "the inward dimension of Islam" or "the phenomenon of mysticism within Islam", is mysticism in Islam, "characterized ... [by particular] values, ritual practices, doctrines and institutions" which began very early in Islamic history and represents "the main manifestation and the most important and central crystallization of" mystical practice in Islam. Practitioners of Sufism have been referred to as "Sufis".
Under the banner of the Delhi Heritage Photography Club, Youth for Heritage Foundation organizes annual exhibitions. A contest is organized for the selection of images and winning shots are exhibited at the venue. The following exhibitions have been organized by the club:
The Archaeological Survey of India is an Indian government agency attached to the Ministry of Culture that is responsible for archaeological research and the conservation and preservation of cultural monuments in the country. It was founded in 1861 by Alexander Cunningham who also became its first Director-General.
The foundation constituted a panel to identify heritage lovers operating within their geographic regions, promoting or protecting Heritage. The first Heritage Ambassador award was given on World Heritage Day, 18 April 2015 to Abdul Aziz Rajput of Bijapur for his service to community.
Bijapur, officially known as Vijayapura, is the district headquarters of Bijapur District of Karnataka state of India. It is also the headquarters for Bijapur Taluka. Bijapur city is well known for its historical monuments of architectural importance built during the rule of the Adil Shahi dynasty. And it also well known for the sports by the popular Karnataka premier league team as Bijapur Bulls. Bijapur is located 530 km northwest of the State Capital Bangalore and about 550 km from Mumbai, and 384 km west of the city of Hyderabad.
Youth for Heritage Foundation has been instrumental in protecting the endangered heritage sites. The group contributed to saving the historic Lal Mahal [9] in Nizamuddin Basti with their #SaveLalMahal campaign. This structure is said to be the oldest structure in India having a true dome and a Taikhana. The structure was being demolished by its owners. Youth for Heritage Foundation raised a petition and upon intervention from different government bodies, the demolition was stopped. [10] [11] [12]
The Qutb complex are monuments and buildings from the Delhi Sultanate at Mehrauli in Delhi in India. The Qutub Minar "victory tower" in the complex, named after the religious figure Qutbuddin Bakhtiar Kaki, was begun by Qutb-ud-din Aibak, who later became the first Sultan of Delhi of the Mamluk dynasty. Construction was continued by his successor Iltutmish, and finally completed much later by Firoz Shah Tughlaq, a Sultan of Delhi from the Tughlaq dynasty in 1368 AD. The Qubbat-ul-Islam Mosque, later corrupted into Quwwat-ul Islam, stands next to the Qutb Minar.
The Qutub Minar, also spelled as Qutab Minar, is a minaret that forms part of the Qutb complex, a UNESCO World Heritage Site in the Mehrauli area of Delhi, India. Qutb Minar is a 73-metre tall tapering tower of five storeys, with a 14.3 metres base diameter, reducing to 2.7 metres at the top of the peak. It contains a spiral staircase of 379 steps. Its design is thought to have been based on the Minaret of Jam, in western Afghanistan.
The Deccan Sultanates were five Muslim dynasties that ruled several late medieval Indian kingdoms, namely Bijapur, Golkonda, Ahmadnagar, Bidar, and Berar in south-western India. The Deccan sultanates were located on the Deccan Plateau, between the Krishna River and the Vindhya Range. These kingdoms became independent during the break-up of the Bahmani Sultanate. They were noted for the destruction of temples and general economic misery. In 1490, Ahmadnagar declared independence, followed by Bijapur and Berar in the same year. Golkonda became independent in 1518 and Bidar in 1528.
Daulatabad, also known as Devagiri, is a 14th-century fort city in Maharashtra state of India, about 16 kilometres (9.9 mi) northwest of Aurangabad. The place was originally named Devagiri when it was an important uplands city along caravan routes, but the intervening centuries have reduced it to a village. However it is also considered to be one of the seven wonders of Maharashtra and a developing tourist spot.
The Qutb Shahi dynasty was a territory in south India. It was initially a highly Persianate Muslim Turkmen dynasty established in the 16th century that eventually adopted the regional culture of the Deccan.
Golkonda, also known as Golconda, Gol konda, or Golla konda, is a citadel and fort in Southern India and was the capital of the medieval sultanate of the Qutb Shahi dynasty (c.1512–1687), is situated 11 km (6.8 mi) west of Hyderabad. It is also a tehsil of Hyderabad district, Telangana, India. The region is known for the mines that have produced some of the world's most famous gems, including the Koh-i-Noor, the Hope Diamond, Nassak Diamond and the Noor-ul-Ain.
The Indian capital city of New Dehli has a long history, and has been an important political centre of India as the capital of several empires. Much of Delhi's ancient history finds no record and this may be regarded as a lost period of its history. Extensive coverage of Delhi's history begins with the onset of the Delhi Sultanate in the 12th century. Since then, Delhi has been the centre of a succession of mighty empires and powerful kingdoms, making Delhi one of the longest-serving capitals and one of the oldest inhabited cities in the world.Delhi is very famous It is considered to be a city built, destroyed and rebuilt several times, as outsiders who successfully invaded the Indian Subcontinent would ransack the existing capital city in Delhi, and those who came to conquer and stay would be so impressed by the city's strategic location as to make it their capital and rebuild it in their own way.
Coronation Park is a park located on Burari Road near Nirankari Sarovar in Delhi, India. The park is sometimes referred to as the Coronation Memorial; it was the venue of the Delhi Durbar of 1877 when Queen Victoria was proclaimed the Empress of India. Later it was used to celebrate the accession of King Edward VII in 1903, and, finally, it was here that the Durbar commemorating the coronation of King George V as Emperor of India took place on 12 December 1911, subsequent to his coronation at Westminster Abbey in June 1911. This last celebration had all the princely states in attendance. The decision to hold the Coronation Durbars in Delhi at the vast open ground at Coronation Park was a move to emphasise the historical significance of Delhi as the former capital of the Mughal Empire.
Barakhamba, also known as Barakhamba Monument, is a 14th-century tomb building from the Tughlaq period that is located in New Delhi, India. Barakhamba means '12 Pillars' in Urdu and Hindi languages. The name has also been used for an upscale modern metro road named the "Barakhamba road" in Connaught Place at the heart of the city.
The Royal Orient is an Indian luxury tourism train that runs between Gujarat and Rajasthan, covering important tourist locations in the two states.
Jahaj Mahal, is located next to Hauz-i-Shamsi in Mehrauli, Delhi on its northeastern corner. It was so named, since its reflection (illusion) in the surrounding reservoir looked like a ship floating on a lake. It is inferred to have been built during the Lodi dynasty period (1452–1526) as a pleasure resort, Sarai or an inn.
Maharashtra, India is famous for its caves and rock cut architecture. It is said that the varieties found in Maharashtra are wider than the caves and rock-cut architecture found in the rock cut areas of Egypt, Assyria, Persia and Greece. The Buddhist monks first started these caves in the 2nd century BC, in search of serene and peaceful environment for meditation, and they found these caves on the hillsides.
Mehrauli Archaeological Park is an archaeological area spread over 200 acre in Mehrauli, Delhi, adjacent to Qutub Minar World Heritage site and the Qutb complex. It consists of over 100 historically significant monuments. It is the only area in Delhi known for 1,000 years of continuous years of occupation, and includes the ruins of Lal Kot built by Tomar Rajputs in 1060 CE, making it the oldest extant fort of Delhi, and architectural relics of subsequent period, rule of Khalji dynasty, Tughlaq dynasty, Lodhi dynasty of Delhi Sultanate, Mughal Empire, and the British Raj.
Delhi Photo Festival is a biennial photography festival organised by the Nazar Foundation in Delhi. The third edition of DPF held from 30 October to 8 November 2015.
Persian Inscriptions on Indian Monuments is a book written in Persian by Dr Ali Asghar Hekmat E Shirazi and published in 1956 and 1958. It contains the Persian texts of more than 80 epigraphical inscriptions found on historical monuments in India, many of which are currently listed as national heritage sites or registered as UNESCO world heritage sites. The most recent edition, containing an additional 200 epigraphical inscriptions from Indian monuments, has been published in Persian; an English edition is also being printed.
The Architecture of Delhi dates back hundreds of years. As the capital of several great empires of India, including the Delhi Sultanate, Mughal Empire, and British Raj, the city of Delhi has been a center for art and architecture.