Few cities boast of three UNESCO World Heritage sites. Agra, home to the Taj Mahal, the abandoned capital of Fatehpur Sikri and the Fort that is its very own Lal Qila, is thrice blessed. The Taj, of course, is the jewel in the crown, attracting 2.2 million visitors in 2004, earning the Archaeological Survey India ASI Rs 13.5 crore in ticket sales.

There are days when the Taj is so packed, says V. Khamo Singh — the Manipur-born CISF commandant who is in charge of security for the 27-acre complex — that 20,000 tourists troop in. The 165-strong CISF posse works in two shifts. ‘‘So on a bad day,’’ she points out, ‘‘you could have a jawan frisking maybe 5,000 people in five hours…Sometimes, it may be difficult for him to keep smiling.’’

If Shah Jahan descended upon his city, he wouldn’t be smiling either. ‘‘Agra,’’ says one ASI official, ‘‘embarrasses the Taj everyday.’’ The monument is being killed slowly, not due to any intrinsic fault — R.K. Dixit, the conservation engineer, says the sal teak used in the foundation has a life of 900 years and the Taj is only 350 — but as a result of municipal homicide.

The Taj is everybody’s baby and nobody’s. The ASI is responsible for its preservation, the Agra Development Authority ADA for its environs and for assisting the ASI in helping tourists. The CISF keeps vigil, its plainclothes men looking out for vandals. Local tourist operators are, of course, there to do business.

By common consensus, the ADA, headed by the district magistrate, is the Taj Mahal’s Enemy Number One. It uses the mausoleum as a milch cow. It gets Rs 250 from every foreign visitor who visits the Taj or its sister monuments, amounting to, says a senior official in Delhi, ‘‘Rs 25 crore or so a year’’. The money is meant to develop Agra.

Instead, the city is a mosquito-infested mess — open drains, bad roads, power cuts, an enveloping darkness that has hoteliers warning guests against venturing out at night. It says something about how sensitive the state government has been to heritage issues that a stone’s throw from the Taj, on the Old Fatehebad Road — now called the Taj Road — are a power station and a Japanese-built leprosy hospital. These are about the last sights you see before entering the planet’s most famous labour of love.

D. Dayalan, superintending archaeologist, waves away questions on the Mathura refinery. ‘‘The acids coming from the refinery are under control,’’ he says, ‘‘they are monitored. But what about environmental pollution? SPM levels are meant to be under 800 units. But sometimes they go above.’’

SPM — suspended particulate matter — is produced by industrial and automobile pollution, the chemical cocktail of urban grime. A dirty Agra cannot ensure a healthy Taj.

Develop the Mehtab Bagh region behind the Taj. If the Yamuna is cleaned, this can be a riverside promenade.
The ASI, ADA, local police, CISF work for no one Taj authority. Archaeologists double as tourism managers. The Taj needs a CEO.
Sanitise the area near the Taj so that curio shops, sidewalk cafes, bookstores, street cultural groups can function into the night.
Fear of vandals, crowds has the ASI keeping tourists out of, for instance, the Sheesh Mahal in the Fort. Charge extra for those who want to go there.
When a foreigner pays Rs 500 to enter, he deserves a well-designed ticket he can keep as a memento, a basic Taj guidebook or a CD.
Fix the official website. Taj is a global brand, it deserves more than one webpage with timings and entry fee.

Neither can it appeal to tourists. The Tourism Guild of Agra TGA is the apex body of the city’s hoteliers, tour operators, emporia owners.

The TGA’s secretary is Debasish Bhowmik, general manager of the Clarks Shiraz, one of Agra’s five five-star hotels. Two months ago, the TGA wrote to the state tourism minister: infrastructure is creaking, the city’s ‘‘tourism experience’’ is simply not enough.

‘‘What does a tourist do after sunset?’’ Bhowmik asks, ‘‘night-viewing of the Taj is only allowed on certain days. Are food festivals enough to keep them entertained?’’ Nightlife is ‘‘non-existent’’, the Sadar Bazaar is deserted by 8 pm. ‘‘We’ve been talking and talking of a night bazaar,’’ mutters a travel industry insider.

The TGA has been pleading with the ADA to light up St John’s College, an impressive Company-era structure that could be an ancillary attraction for upper-end tourists. Sidewalk cafes and cultural shows are non-existent.

The government-organised Taj Mahotsav takes place in spring, after the peak season, and is quickly reduced to a binging session for local officials. ‘‘Foreigners come in mere hundreds,’’ complains Sandeep Arora, president, Hotel and Restaurant Association of Agra — a collective of budget hotels — ‘‘but at the Pushkar Mela they go in thousands.’’ A local hotel manager quotes a French tour operator: ‘‘Jaipur has so much more to do.’’

1.8 million tourists visit the Taj every year, 364,000 foreigners. The Taj alone earns the ASI Rs 13.5 crore, all three Agra monuments, Rs 25.3 crore. Rs 3 crore is spent on the Taj’s upkeep
Foreigners pay Rs 250 to the ADA and Rs 250 to the ASI to enter the Taj. The ADA fee is valid for one day, the ASI fee for one visit. Indians pay Rs 10
The ADA earns about Rs 25 crore a year from the Taj but Agra remains such a mess that average hotel stay is 1.4 days. In 2003 it was 0.87 days

No wonder tourists take the expressway from Delhi, and zip in and out of the Taj area, bypassing Agra. The figures say it. Agra has 2,800 rooms in approved roughly three star and above hotels. Average stay in these hotels was 1.4 days in 2004. In 2003, it was 0.87 days.

MEANWHILE the Taj is a construction site near its two main gates. The ASI, with funding from the Tata Group, is setting up facilitation/interpretation centres. Since as per Supreme Court orders nothing, not even water bottles are allowed inside, water coolers and well-appointed toilets are in place. Even a few miles away, the toilets at Fathepur Sikri wear a more familiar, grotty look — but the Taj has the showpiece urinals.

In terms of conservation, Dixit refers to the recent ‘‘mudpack … a sort of multani mitti treatment for monuments’’ that has left the Taj’s archways looking whiter.

The dome itself looks visibly darker. Its ‘‘primary cleaning agent is rainwater’’. Appropriately, the Taj’s deliverance from Agra may also have to be a gift from heaven.