Decision on ashram’s heritage status to be known next week

The Vivekananda Ashram in Brickfields is more than a century old. – The Malaysian Insider file pic, July 3, 2015.A decision on whether to gazette the century-old Vivekananda Ashram in Brickfields, Kuala Lumpur, as a national heritage building is expected to be announced next week, The Star Metro reported.

The issue was apparently raised at the ministry’s post-Cabinet meeting on Wednesday, and that Tourism and Culture Minister Datuk Seri Mohamed Nazri Aziz was briefed on the decision.

Nazri told The Star Metro that the National Heritage Commission would make the official announcement.

Heritage Commissioner Dr Zainah Ibrahim is currently overseas and could not be reached for comments.

The Malaysian Insider had reported last month that the National Heritage Commission had met with the stakeholders, including the trustees and the Save Vivekananda Ashram Brickfields Action Committee, to discuss the proposal to gazette the 110-year-old ashram as a national heritage site.

The government had earlier planned to gazette the 110-year-old building as a heritage site but the proposal was twice rejected by the ashram’s board of trustees.

The board of trustees has previously submitted a proposal to sell and redevelop the land into a 23-storey apartment tower.

However due to objection from various parties and individuals from all over Malaysia, City Hall put a temporary halt to the project.

In January, the government notified Vivekananda Ashram that it planned to designate the land as heritage site as per section 27(2) of the National Heritage Act 2005.

Brickfields Asia College co-founder Raja Singham, who has been instrumental in efforts to save the site, had been reported as saying that the effort should not stop at just saving the place.

“It will be pointless to have the place locked up just like it has been over the last 10 years.”

He said it was time the ashram returns to its glory days when it first started about 100 years ago.

“It was an education centre then, just as Swami Vivekananda wanted. Historical records show the place was a centre for mathematics and it was also a community gathering point.”

He said that even in the early 1990s, various dance and vocal classes, yoga lessons and other spiritual activities were held there.

The ashram management had cited financial problems as the reason for its redevelopment, prompting Raja to offer financial help.

- TMI