National Incubation Center Hyderabad has met Dr Nilofer Shaikh, Chairperson of the Centre for Documentation and Conservation of the Heritage of Sindh, to discuss a possible collaboration and memorandum of understanding that would link heritage preservation with technology and entrepreneurship. The centre works under the Endowment Fund Trust. The incubator began the discussion from a challenge it sees in the province, that Sindh’s heritage holds centuries of history, knowledge and culture, and that the task is to preserve it in ways that keep it accessible and relevant for future generations.
The proposed collaboration has three parts. It would promote startups that work in heritage preservation, explore the digitisation of content on Sindh’s heritage and archaeological sites, and host related sessions and events at the incubator. For startups, the incubator says, this offers a chance to apply their ideas and expertise to a field where innovation can make a lasting difference. Technology can help in several ways, from documenting archaeological sites to making historical knowledge easier for the public to reach, and the incubator sees new avenues for preserving the province’s cultural legacy.
Dr Nilofer Shaikh is an archaeologist who specialises in the Neolithic and Bronze Age of South Asia and the Indus Valley Civilisation, and has led excavations and surveys across Sindh, including at Mohenjo-Daro. She was Vice Chancellor of Shah Abdul Latif University in Khairpur for five years and holds the Tamgha-e-Imtiaz. The Endowment Fund Trust for Preservation of the Heritage of Sindh was set up by the provincial government in 2008 with a fund of Rs1 billion for conservation projects, and its documentation centre was created to survey heritage sites, map them and prepare condition reports.
A link between a heritage body and an incubator could give startups access to material and expertise that they would otherwise struggle to find, such as archaeological records, site data and specialist knowledge. For the trust, it could offer new ways of documenting and sharing sites that are at risk. The MoU has not yet been signed, and details such as the startups to be supported, the content to be digitised and the timetable for events have not been announced. National Incubation Center Hyderabad is one of the national incubation centres set up by Ignite National Technology Fund and the Ministry of Information Technology and Telecommunication.
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