The city’s history is taking a giant digital leap, from fading pages to virtual reality headgears, promising to add dimensions to the experience of “experiencing” heritage.
Researchers at the Design Department of Indian Institute of Technology-Hyderabad are working on conserving the city’s heritage through virtual reality (VR), giving narration a digital but a life-like feel. Stories being told, at the moment of those from the Qutb Shahi era, aim to teleport one to the time in which the historical incidents occurred.
“During a walk-through of the Hayat Bakshi Begum Mosque, possible from any part of the world, one may hear her story from a character resembling the queen mother herself, made possible through a life-like rendering of characters,” said Delwyn Jude Remedios, an assistant professor working on the project, while talking about the various possibilities for narration being explored.
The Design Innovation Centre at IIT-H, supported by the Central government’s Ministry of Human Resource Development, is equipped with a laser scanner that is key to bringing VR to life in historical structures.
The scanner, much like a camera, provides detailed information of a structure, including its physical attributes, materials and other data required to recreate or render it in the virtual world. Scanning structures like those on the scale of Qutb Shahi era monuments can take months. The Hayat Bakshi Begum Mosque’s architecture, notably the defining arches, and accompanying serai , make for an imposing complex on what used to be the old route to Machilipatnam. The researchers hope to recreate that feel in the virtual reality tour.
Hayat Bakshi Begum, daughter of Hyderabad’s founder Mohammed Quli, reigned over the affairs of Golconda, being the Shah’s only child. She was married to Sultan Mohammed and their son Abdullah ascended the throne.
As the Queen Mother, she came to be fondly called Ma Saheba , as she oversaw administration until her son attained adulthood.
With the mosque’s scanning completed, the IIT team is scanning the tombs of Qutb Shahi kings at the tombs complex, which is being restored by the Aga Khan Trust for Culture, to narrate other stories of Hyderabad’s history.
