It Will Take Nine Years to Clean the Taj Majal
“Mudpack therapy” will help the iconic monument clean up its act
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There’s never any harm in a bit of cleaning. But when the thing in need of cleaning is the Taj Mahal, the task can seem daunting indeed. The AFP reports that the monumental mausoleum is due for a deep cleanse — and that the process will take a whopping nine years.
The culprit is carbon, writes the AFP. Despite a local ban on burning cow dung and coal, dark particles in the air have caused the building’s white marble exterior to yellowed over the years.
So how does one clean a 240-foot-high architectural tour de force? With mud, of course. The Times of India’s Aditya Dev reports that “mudpack therapy,” a method of packing clay on the marble to remove surface deposits, will be employed over the next nine years. In fact, it’s not the first time mud has been used to clean the Taj Mahal: The building has received the treatment several times in the past two decades.
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