Mysore/Mysuru, June 24 -- In a perpetuating exercise towards the conservation of the now defunct Lansdowne Building, opposite City Bus Stand in Mysuru, a team of experts from the The Indian National Trust for Art and Cultural Heritage (INTACH) have been collecting the samples of construction materials of yore.

A make-shift machinery, comprising a motor pump and metal rods, is used to dig deep into the surface in front of the Lansdowne building, a 133-year-old heritage structure, built using lime and mortar, to collect samples of the sand/soil, through an outlet pipe, to study the strength of the building. Along with this, the samples of foundation bricks used in the construction of pillars are also being collected, but in a conventional ...