Work could start within a month once the approvals come through and the tenders are issued. The remaining Rs 2.5 crore will come after the institute produces the ‘utilisation certificate’ of the Rs 5 crore grant.

“The cultural ministry is scrutinising our plans and we expect the approval will come soon. It is a long process. The government machinery and wheels rotate slowly,” said M D Dhadphale, honorary secretary, BORI.

BORI has earmarked the funds for three purposes. “We have planned the restoration work of the campus of three heritage buildings. New construction will involve library extension, a small museum, an auditorium of over 200 seats, and an international standard level guest house which will house Indian and foreign scholars,” he said.

Prior to the Union budget, when the Finance Minister made a unannounced visit to the institute in December 2006 to gauge its needs, he made an on the spot allocation of Rs 2 crore for the purpose of digitisation of the library and of as many rare manuscripts as possible. Two years down the line, that money has not come in. “The committee set up for this process is yet to finalise the plans. However, the work has begun at the institute on the project,” said Dhadphale. The digitisation project work will be undertaken by CDAC. For now, the institute is cataloguing the manuscripts as per requirement.

Sitting pretty today on cache of funds, the ninety-year-old institute is a long way off from four years ago when vandals attacked after author James Laine’s book on Shivaji came under the scanner of the ‘Shambhaji Brigade.’

The institute had to depend on donations to the tune of Rs 50 lakh from various entities to make good the damage to the main hall and furniture. “There was some irrevocable damage to some books. Most of the books that were damaged belonged to R G Bhandarkar,” said Shrinand Bapat, member of the staff.

The institute lost three items at the time of vandalism — an 18th century Ganesh icon, a ceremonial spearhead reported to be of a tribal origin and an album of photographs of the Nizams. Four years later, they are still missing the first two. “The album was returned to us by the police a three months after the vandal attack on January 4,” said Bapat.