Shri Praveen Sharma (US), Puratatva Bhawan, 'D' Block, 2nd Floor, INA, New Delhi

Phone: 24642159Email : bti-section-culture@gov.in

Preservation and Development of Cultural Heritage of the Himalayas.

The objective of the scheme is to promote, protect and preserve the cultural heritage of the Himalayan region spreading in Jammu & Kashmir, Himachal Pradesh, Uttrakhand, Sikkim and Arunachal Pradesh through research, documentation, dissemination, etc.

• The voluntary organization should be registered as a society under the societies Registration Act 1860 or as a public trust under Indian Trust Act, 1882 and shall have been functioning for a period of three years.
• The Colleges and Universities are also eligible to apply.
• The organisation should have the capacity to undertake and promote research projects. It should have facilities, resources and personnel to implement the scheme for which the grant is required.
• The Colleges and Universities should introduce in their curricula or research course aspects of studies relating to preservation of Himalayan art and culture, in case not already done.
• A college applying for the grant should be affiliated to the University.
• The grants will be ad-hoc and of non-recurring nature.
• Grants from this scheme will be given only to those organizations which are not in receipt of grants from any other source for similar purposes.
• Organizations which are doing good work in the field and having resources for meeting matching funds will be given preference.

The financial assistance is given for any of the items listed below up to a maximum of Rs.10.00 lakhs to any single organisation :

The maximum grant admissible to an organization would be 75% of the total expenditure to be incurred on any item subject to maximum ceiling fixed. The remaining 25% expenditure or more should be met by the State Govt./U.T. Administration failing which the grantee organization could contribute the amount from their own resources. However, in the case of Arunachal Pradesh and Sikkim, funding will be shared between the Government of India and the organization in the ratio of 90:10 respectively.

The organization shall submit complete application alongwith the following documents/information to judge the eligibility of the organization through the State Government, where the project is proposed to be implemented, to the Ministry of Culture. The organisations, however, located in Sikkim, Arunachal Pradesh & Leh and Kargil districts of Jammu & Kashmir are exempted to submit their applications direct to Ministry of Culture only with the recommendation of concerned District Collector/Dy Commissioner. The Universities and Colleges shall forward their applications through the U.G.C to Ministry of Culture.

Recommendation :

The State Governments/District Collector/ Deputy Commissioner/UGC while recommending the proposal will :

• Verify the Registration status of the organisation.
• Certify that the voluntary organisation is capable of undertaking such projects.
• Certify that project on the title/area proposed to be undertaken has not been undertaken in the past and it is a new project.
• Recommend the activity/activities and the amount thereto.

• Grant shall be given based on the appraisal of applications and recommendation by the Expert Advisory Committee and thereafter administrative approval and financial concurrence of competent authorities in the Ministry of Culture.
• The Grants will be paid in two equal installments, the first being normally released with the approval of the project. The second installment will be released on completion of project and on receipt of duly audited statement of accounts showing the utilization of the entire amount of grant plus the share of the grantee/concerned State/U.T. Government and other documents. The release of the balance of grant will be decided on the basis of the actual expenditure incurred on the project subject to the maximum limit.
• An organization in receipt of financial assistance under the scheme shall be open to inspection by an officer of the Ministry of Culture, Government of India or the State Government concerned.
• The accounts of the project shall be maintained properly and separately and submitted to the Government of India as and when required and will be subject to check by an officer of the Central Government or the State Government or by the Comptroller and Auditor General of India at his discretion.
• The grantee shall maintain :
  • Subsidiary accounts of the grants-in-aid received from the Government.
  • Cash book Register in hand written bound books duly machine numbered.
  • Grant-in-aid Register for the grant received from the Government and other agencies.
  • Separate ledgers for each item of expenditure like construction of civil work, etc.
• The organization shall maintain a record of all assets acquired wholly or substantially out of the Central Government grant and shall not dispose of or encumber or utilize for purposes other than those for which the grant was given without prior approval of the Government of India.
• If at any time, the Government of India has reason to believe that the sanctioned money is not being utilized for approved purposes, the payment of grant may be stopped and the earlier grants recovered.
• The organization must exercise reasonable economy in the working of the approved project.
• The grantee organization shall furnish to the Ministry of Culture a quarterly progress report of the project indicating in detail both the physical achievements and the expenditure incurred on each of the approved items separately.
• The grantee shall submit three copies of the Project Report duly bound/Audio-Video CDs/Photographs to the Ministry of Culture and one copy to the State Government where the project has been undertaken.
• Applications of the organisations against which previous grant/ Utilisation certificate is pending will not be considered.

All payments will be made through electronic transfers.

A Performance-cum-achievement Report on the activity undertaken will be submitted in triplicate, duly bound, at the time of seeking final installment to the Ministry. It should include, inter alia, an Executive Summary of the Project Report, no. of beneficiary, location of project, etc as per the following format :

Scheme of Financial Assistance for the Preservation and Development of Cultural Heritage of the Himalayas

Performance-cum-achievement Report

Project Title : ______________

Signature_____________

President/Secretary of organisation

Incomplete applications not supported by the required documents and applications received without recommendation of the prescribed authority will not be considered and summarily rejected.

The Expert Advisory Committee on the scheme is empowered to recommend or reject any proposal received without or with the recommendation of State Government/U.T. administration/ Local Administration and also to recommend the amount beyond the maximum limit but not exceeding Rs.30.00 lacs from this scheme, in respect of any proposal which is of outstanding merit for which the EAC feels that the maximum limit would not be sufficient for undertaking the said project, with the approval of Minister (Culture) and concurrence of AS & FA, Ministry of Culture.

Inspection would be carried out by Ministry officials every year at least in 5% of the cases. The concerned State Govt., District Collector/Dy. Commissioner will also monitor.

The members of the executive body of the organisation would be liable for recovery of misused grants. The organisation will also be blacklisted for misuse of funds, fake registration certificate, etc. All immovable assets created from the Government grants would be taken over by local administration prescribed by the Ministry of Culture.