Positions & proposals · July 2026 · PWHI analysis
Four objectives. One programme.
Everything PWHI publishes serves four goals: protect the six properties Pakistan has already promised the world to keep; convert the 29-site nomination pipeline into inscriptions; establish, place by place, which of the 6,200 catalogued sites still exist on the ground; and repair the governance system whose failure produced a 29-year inscription drought and the Taxila crisis. These are civil-society proposals, offered for adoption.
Objective 01 — Defend
Protect the six inscribed properties
World Heritage status is a treaty obligation, not a trophy. Pakistan’s Article 4 duty requires active protection of authenticity and integrity at Moenjodaro, Taxila, Takht-i-Bahi, Makli, Lahore Fort & Shalamar, and Rohtas.
- Taxila corrective action now: halt cement works at Mohra Moradu and Sirkap; commission an independent HIA; invite an ICOMOS/ICCROM Reactive Monitoring Mission; provide full para-172 documentation to the World Heritage Centre before and after the Busan session.
- Statutory conservation standard: an enforceable legal distinction between scientific conservation/anastylosis and reconstruction, binding on every custodian department and contractor.
- Buffer-zone enforcement: apply s.22’s 200-foot zone and WHS visual corridors through planning authorities (LDA, CDA, KDA, cantonments).
- Condition transparency: annual published state-of-conservation reports for all six properties, in English and Urdu.
Objective 02 — Advance
Convert the 29-site pipeline into inscriptions
Seven candidates have waited since 1993. The pipeline grows; conversion never comes. The blockage is institutional: provinces prepare dossiers, the federation submits them, and neither funds the work.
- World Heritage Nomination Task Force: a standing federal–provincial body with professional dossier-writers, comparative-analysis capacity and a published work plan.
- Two to three priority nominations in 36 months — selected on OUV strength and readiness, with public criteria.
- Budget lines for dossiers: nomination preparation funded in the federal PSDP and provincial ADPs — the cheapest, highest-return heritage investment available.
- Readiness scorecards for all 29, published annually (the pipeline tracker is our civil-society version).
- Domestic protection first: Tentative status protects nothing — every candidate site must be brought under a domestic protection instrument immediately.
Objective 03 — Reform
Fix the governance system
Since the 18th Amendment devolved archaeology in 2010, provincial custodianship and federal treaty responsibility have operated without a bridge. The result: 89.0% of 6,200 catalogued places unprotected, statutes protecting as few as eight sites, penalties frozen at 1975 values, and no mandatory heritage impact assessment anywhere in federal law.
- National Heritage & World Heritage Compliance Bill: mandatory HIAs for works affecting protected sites; the conservation/reconstruction distinction; modernised penalties; chance-finds duties.
- Federal–provincial coordination body (a National Heritage Conservation Authority or a standing CCI committee) co-owned by federal and provincial secretaries.
- Harmonised provincial statutes: a model provincial heritage law — buffer zones, HIA duties, real sanctions, protection procedures that actually get used.
- Taxila International Conservation Centre: convert the crisis into capacity — an ICCROM/UNESCO-partnered national training laboratory for conservation science.
- Protection at scale: a national programme to assess and notify the highest-value unprotected sites — starting with the 553 tombs, 199 stupa/monastery complexes, 142 temples and 114 forts currently outside every statute.
Objective 04 — Know
Ground-truth the 6,200
No protection system can work blind. The national inventory lists 6,200 places, but there has never been a published national condition census — nobody can say how many still exist on the ground, how many are encroached, and how many have quietly vanished since their last survey.
- A National Heritage Condition Census: a time-bound, published verification of all 6,200 inventory entries — standing, at risk, damaged, encroached, vanished, or not found — combining departmental survey with accredited citizen verification (the Ground Truth campaign is the civil-society pilot).
- Delisting with a record: where a site is confirmed lost, the loss is documented and published before any record is amended — erasure must never be silent.
- Census-driven prioritisation: protection notifications, conservation budgets and nomination shortlists keyed to verified condition data.
- Open inventory: the verified register published as open data, updated annually, so courts, researchers and citizens work from the same facts.
The 36-month roadmap
Months 0–3 — Stabilise
Taxila works halted; independent HIA commissioned; Reactive Monitoring Mission invited; Nomination Task Force notified; priority-site shortlisting begins.
Months 3–12 — Legislate & fund
Compliance Bill drafted and consulted; dossier budget lines in FY ADPs/PSDP; readiness assessments for all 29 published; Taxila Centre feasibility completed.
Months 12–24 — Build
Two priority dossiers in full preparation; model provincial law adopted by at least two provinces; annual state-of-conservation reports published for all six properties.
Months 24–36 — Deliver
First nomination submitted to the World Heritage Centre; Taxila Centre operational; national unprotected-sites programme notifying its first tranche.
Status of these proposals
PWHI analysis and advocacy — civil-society proposals offered for adoption by federal and provincial decision-makers. They are not government policy, and nothing here is legal advice. Sources: the protection-gap dataset (6,200 records), the UNESCO WHC record for Pakistan, and the statutes catalogued in the PWHI law library.