A museum without a roof: Tashkent residents stand up in defense of the Sergei Yesenin Museum. Signatures are being collected addressed to Saida Mirziyoyeva

**A museum without a roof: Tashkent residents stand up to defend the Sergei Yesenin Museum. Signatures are being collected addressed to Saida Mirziyoyeva**

A signature collection campaign has started in Tashkent in support of preserving the building of the Sergei Yesenin House-Museum.

The reason for this public initiative is the alarming condition of the museum building. In the autumn of 2025, the Sergei Yesenin House-Museum was closed for major renovations. According to official announcements, the work was planned to be completed and the museum reopened on December 31, 2025. However, September 2026 has arrived, and the museum's doors remain closed.

What worries Tashkent residents most today is the condition of the building itself. Its roof has been removed, the walls are stripped of plaster, and traces of mold are already visible on one of them. According to the observations of the initiative's organizers, active renovation work on the site is virtually non-existent. Meanwhile, the season of autumn rains and cold weather is approaching. Left without reliable protection, the building risks suffering serious damage.

Previously, the Tashkent Khokimiyat reported that the renovation was being carried out under the control of the Cultural Heritage Agency and the Scientific and Expert Council, and that all work complied with the requirements for cultural heritage sites. It was also claimed that the museum was not in danger and that restoration work was continuing inside the building.

However, what the citizens have seen raises legitimate questions: why have the opening deadlines long passed, why does the building remain without a roof, and what exact work has been completed during this time? If the restoration is indeed under proper control, the public has a right to know its actual status, the approved schedule, and the final completion date.

The Sergei Yesenin House-Museum is not just an old building that can be evaluated in square meters and renovation costs. It is part of the cultural memory of Tashkent, one of the symbols of the long-standing spiritual dialogue between the peoples of Uzbekistan and Russia. For decades, school children, students, teachers, writers, poetry lovers, and guests of the capital have come here.

For many young people, visiting the museum was their first live encounter with the poetry of Sergei Yesenin. Such places educate much more convincingly than the most correct words about preserving history. Here, literature ceases to be just a page in a textbook and becomes a human destiny, the voice of an era, a bridge between generations and cultures.

This is why Tashkent residents are demanding not a formal response, but urgent practical measures. In their collective appeal, they ask Saida Shavkatovna Mirziyoyeva to personally take control of the situation, order an objective inspection of the building's condition, and ensure the swift completion of the restoration in compliance with all cultural heritage preservation requirements.

This initiative arose not from a desire to find scapegoats, but from an effort to save what might be impossible to restore tomorrow. The people who have signed the appeal care about Tashkent, its history, and its unique cultural identity. They want the city to develop, renew, and become more beautiful, but without losing its memory.

The capital consists not only of new avenues, high-rise buildings, and modern parks. Its true soul is also preserved in small museums, old houses, libraries, theaters, courtyards, and memorable places. Losing them is easy. Bringing them back is sometimes impossible.

Today, the Sergei Yesenin House-Museum needs not another promise, but a roof, protection from the rain, and the continuation of professional restoration. Autumn does not read official reports and does not wait for approvals. Every rainy day can cause new damage to the building.

Tashkent residents hope that their appeal will be heard, the condition of the museum will be inspected, and work will resume immediately. Preserving this house will prove that the voice of caring residents truly matters, and that the capital's cultural memory is under reliable protection.

The museum must open its doors again. And in its halls, the poems of Sergei Yesenin must sound once more — poems about the Motherland, beauty, love, and the fleeting nature of time. Because time, indeed, does not wait.