Tarun Karthick
Sri Vijaya Puram, 28 September 2025
On September 27, 2025, World Tourism Day, I decided to take advantage of the free entry being offered and visited two museums near the city centre in Sri Vijaya Puram. What I thought would be an enriching day of learning turned out to be a sobering experience, exposing just how neglected our museums have become.
My first stop was the Fisheries Museum-Cum-Aquarium at Marina Park, opposite the swimming pool. The visit was utterly disappointing. All I found were wet specimens of various fish arranged inside glass-covered shelves, along with corals also displayed behind glass. The aquariums themselves were unimpressive — some even lacked the fish that the labels claimed were inside. The wet specimens had yellowed with age and were far from clear.
Visitors around me showed the same lack of enthusiasm. There was simply nothing engaging or exciting to see. Ironically, the most impressive part of the museum was outside: a massive sperm whale skeleton, retrieved years ago from a beach in Little Andaman. If I had to rate the museum, it would barely deserve a one star— and that only because the toilets were reasonably clean.
Next, I went to the Zonal Anthropological Museum, located opposite Bengali Club. The building itself is imposing, but what lies inside is hollow. Exhibits spread across mainly two floors — the first, and second — felt haphazardly arranged. Information was scarce; many displays had only a label, with no meaningful explanation of their cultural or historical significance.
For an anthropological museum, one expects either a proper audio guide or detailed panels that tell the story behind each artefact. Instead, the displays felt lifeless and disconnected.
The audio-visual room was the biggest letdown. For ten minutes, I sat through grainy videos on an old television screen. The content was outdated, the visuals unwatchable, and the entire experience was frankly disturbing. What should have been an immersive learning space was instead an embarrassment.
In complete contrast, during my visit to Patna in 2019, I experienced the Bihar Museum, which was a revelation. It was modern, well-organized, and world-class. Guided tours were available, every exhibit was backed by a clear narrative, and the audio-visual theatre offered a professional, engaging experience. It showed what a museum can truly be when designed and managed with vision.
Sadly, the same cannot be said for our museums in the Andamans. Both the Fisheries Museum-Cum-Aquarium and the Zonal Anthropological Museum are outdated, poorly maintained, and lack the depth needed to inspire visitors. They are in desperate need of modernisation — from infrastructure to exhibit curation.
We should be ashamed that despite branding ourselves as a tourist destination, our museums are in such poor shape. Unless serious upgrades are undertaken, they will remain disappointments — even if entry were free all year round. It’s time we learned from places like Bihar and gave our museums the attention they deserve.
