Archaeological Survey of India and Google's 360° project goes live

NEW DELHI: India's most famous monuments can now be viewed online. The iconic Taj Mahal, Red Fort, Humayun's Tomb amongst other popular sites will now be available for online viewing with a 360-degree panoramic view, thanks to an initiative by Google and Archaeological Survey of India ( ASI).

ASI and Google on Thursday jointly launched a 360-degree panoramic imagery of 30 out of 100 "nationally-important monuments" including Red Fort, Humayun's Tomb, Jantar Mantar and Qutub Minar among others, viewable to one-third of the world's population. Union culture minister Chandresh Kumati Katoch launched the project at Safdarjung Tomb and said the initiative would bring Indian heritage closer to the doorstep of every person. "Today, this partnership with Google makes it possible for billions of people across the world to see and explore our magnificent heritage, to take a walk at the Rock Cut Jain Temple, to marvel at the Nagarjuna Konda Buddhist Stupas and to relive history in Fatehpur Sikri. With the release of these new panoramic images, we aim to create a dynamic, immersive online experience by which people within India and around the world can understand and engage more of India's diverse cultural heritage," she said.

The search engine giant and the Ministry of Culture had signed a memorandum at the Qutub Minar complex last year in October, following which the company created a "virtual walkthrough" application using its 'Street View Trekker' technology for the first time in India. Among the 30 monuments are Agra Fort, Fatehpur Sikri, Agha Khan Palace, Bibi ka Maqbara, Fort St George, Nagarjuna Hill, Raigad Fort.

"India is unique in terms of the sheer wealth of heritage and iconic historical monuments, and it has been our privilege to work with the ASI in collecting new 360-degree photos of 30 Indian heritage sites. We hope the imagery will help make India's heritage and culture more accessible to people at home and abroad. Imagine the iconic Taj Mahal, now being accessible to not just over 20 crore Indians on the web but about one-third of the world population, without even having to go there," said Google India MD Rajan Anandan. "The extent of a monuments' view a user (virtual visitor) can see online is what has been allowed to us by the ASI. We delivered the first 30 sites in five months, and we are now working on the next 70," he added.

Talking about the criteria used for selection of the sites, ASI director general Praveen Srivastava said, "We of course focused on World Heritage Sites and on sites of archaeological importance. Also, we chose places which receive large number of tourists inflow." The 30 monuments will be now available to viewers on GoogleMaps and on the World Wonders site, part of Google Cultural Institute.