10 Indian historical monuments to remain open till 9 PM

The very popular Humayun’s Tomb in Delhi will now remain open for visitors till 9 PM. Recently, Union Culture Minister Prahlad Singh Patel announced that the opening hours of 10 heritage sites, including Humayun’s Tomb, have been tweaked, and will now remain open from sunrise to 9 PM for visitors.

This move comes in the wake of the government’s effort to attract more and more visitors to these sites. Other heritage sites that will be included in this league are the Safdarjung Tomb in Delhi, Sheikh Chilli Tomb of Haryana, Odisha’s Rajarani Temple complex, Pattadakkal’s Group of Temples in Karnataka and Gol Gumbaz in Karnataka, Markanda Group of Temples in Maharashtra, Rani ki Vav in Gujarat, Man Mahal of Uttar Pradesh, and Duladeo Temple in Khajuraho.
As of now, the monuments that used to remain open from 6 AM to 10 PM in Delhi were Purana Qila, Qutub Minar, Red Fort, and Abdul Rahim Khan-i-Khana’s tomb at Nizamuddin. In addition, ticketed sites that are under the Archaeological Survey of India (ASI) follow the sunrise-to-sunset schedule.
As per reports, the Cultural Ministry had been formulating strategies since 2018 to extend the timings of the proposed sites as the Tourism Ministry proposed to keep the sites open till late evening.
Reportedly, visitors have frequently complained about the lack of entry to historic monuments after sundown. Apparently, the new move has been made after a lot of consideration.

ASI has approximately 116 ticketed heritage sites across the country, of which Delhi houses the prestigious 10. Reports suggest that if the current plan becomes successful, the closing time of more sites will be extended as well.