Guwahati, Jan 21 (PTI) ‘Maidams’, the burial mounds of Ahom royalty also known as ‘Assam’s pyramids’, will be India’s sole nomination for recognition as a UNESCO World Heritage Site this year, Chief Minister Himanta Biswa Sarma said on Saturday.

The dossier on the ‘maidams’, in Assam’s Charaideo district, has been selected by Prime Minister Narendra Modi out of 52 heritage sites across the country seeking the coveted tag, Sarma said at a press conference here.1

‘The Prime Minister had viewed the exhibition and this nomination has been possible due to his interest in this heritage of ours. It is a matter of great honour for Assam that the country has decided to forward the World Heritage Site nomination dossier to UNESCO for evaluation’, the chief minister said.

The UNESCO team will visit Charaideo in September and it is expected to be declared a World Heritage site by March 2024, he said.

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• 1. The Prime Minister’s Office, Union Ministry of Cultural Affairs “informed me of this momentous news and the nomination will be submitted to the UNESCO office in Paris tonight”, he said. The ‘Maidams’ or the mound burial system of the Ahom dynasty in Charaideo was first listed in the tentative list of UNESCO’s World Heritage site in April 2014, he added. ‘It took nine years for the dossier to reach the nomination status from the tentative list and this was possible only due to the initiative of the Prime Minister’, Sarma said. During the 400th birth anniversary celebrations of Ahom General Lachit Borphukan in New Delhi, an exhibition was held at Vigyan Bhawan which included a model of ‘Maidam’ that showcased the unique burial architecture and tradition of the Tai Ahoms, he said.