The Hoysala temples of Belur, Halebid and Somnathapura, the ‘Sacred Ensembles of the Hoysala’, in Karnataka have been finalised as India’s nomination for United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organisation’s (UNESCOs) World Heritage List for the year 2022-2023.
- Permanent Representative of India to the UNESCO Vishal V Sharma formally submitted the nomination of Hoysala Temples to UNESCO Director of World Heritage Lazare Eloundou.
- These Hoysala Temples have been on UNESCO’s Tentative list since April 15, 2014, for its rich historical and cultural heritage of India.
- A team from UNESCO will visit the sites and conduct an inspection in September or October 2022. After the inspection, it will be decided whether the monuments can be declared as heritage sites.
Sites included in World Heritage Sites List:
i.If the Hoysala temples attain the World Heritage status, Belur, Halebid and Somnathapura monuments will be 4th on the state’s list of World Heritage Sites.
ii.The other three include the Hampi Monuments of Vijayanagara, Pattadakal Temples complex of the Chalukyan era and the Western Ghats.
About Hoysala Temples:
i.All the three Hoysala temples are protected monuments of the Archaeological Survey of India (ASI) and its conservation and maintenance will be done by the Ministry of Culture.
- The state government will ensure the conservation of state-protected monuments which are around these three Hoysala monuments.
ii.They were built in 12th -13th centuries which has a basic Dravidian architecture but shows strong influences of Bhumija architecture widely used in Central India, the Nagara traditions of northern and western India and the Karnataka Dravida architecture by kalyani chalukyas.
About Hoysala Empire:
i.The Hoysala emperors ruled the present day Karnataka and Tamil Nadu for more than 3 centuries with the initial capital as Belur, then later changed to Halebidu.
ii.Sala was the founder of Hoysala dynasty and other few rulers were Vishnuvardhana, Narasimha I, Narasimha III, Veera Ballala III etc,.
About World Heritage Site:
i.A world heritage site can be either cultural or natural areas or objects which are inscribed on UNESCO’s World Heritage List for having outstanding universal value.
- These sites are usually considered to have cultural significance to all the people in the world.
Additional Info:
On the occasion of World Hindi Day, (January 10, 2022) UNESCO’s World Heritage Centre (WHC) had agreed to publish Hindi descriptions of India’s UNESCO World Heritage Sites on the WHC website.
Recent related news:
The 41st session of United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organisation (UNESCO) General Conference was held in Paris, France in November 2021 presided by permanent delegate of Brazil to UNESCO, Ambassador, Santiago Irazabal Mourao
About United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organisation (UNESCO):
Director-General – Audrey Azoulay
Headquarters – Paris, France
