BENGALURU: There is a need to formulate a new plan and bring in stringent laws to protect manuscripts in state, as they are an asset, Minister for Law and Parliamentary Affairs and Tourism HK Patil said on Thursday.
Patil was speaking at the inauguration of a daylong workshop titled ‘Preservation and Digitisation of Manuscripts’ organised by the Department of Archaeology, Museums, and Heritage.
A comprehensive report on Indian heritage, manuscript preservation, and digitisation was also released on the occasion. He said though there is a law to protect heritage monuments, only 800 of the 25,000 monuments identified in the state are protected.
“All departments should work in tandem and at a faster pace to cover and protect all of them. A target of protecting at least 5,000 monuments during this government’s tenure has been set,” he added.
Expressing regret that the government did not pay much attention to the prevention of manuscripts and scholarly works so far, Patil said a law will also be brought to encourage people to hand over or even declare the manuscripts in their possession with the government.
The report detailed the works done by various institutions in Karnataka for digitisation and protection of manuscripts. According to the data available, there are 1,20,835 manuscripts collected by various associations, organisations, monasteries, private individuals, universities, and government departments in Karnataka.
This report also includes detailed institutional notes with the comprehensive policy overview earlier submitted to the Union Government showing the efforts that the Karnataka government is taking in manuscript preservation and digital heritage management.
The report also listed the creation of a unified Karnataka Digital Heritage Portal integrating manuscripts, printed books and archival documents under one digital platform. This initiative aligns with the Digital India Mission and the National Mission for Manuscripts.
The report listed the plan of establishing National Centre for History of Indian Sciences at Oriental Research Institute (ORI) Mysuru, training digital archivists, implementing AI-powered tools for script recognition and metadata tagging, and expanding digitisation capacity.
The report also noted that the ORI has initiated the programme of digitising its entire manuscript collection and also opening its own0 website so that the huge collection of palm leaf and paper manuscripts can be made available to interested scholars across the world.
The ORI has also signed an MoU with Mahabaratha Prathishthana of Bengaluru. The Indira Gandhi National Centre for Arts, New Delhi, will also be involved in the institute’s digitisation programme, the report read. wIn her speech, Chief Secretary Shalini Rajneesh said that the government is aiming to collect 1 lakh manuscripts and digitise them for better protection.
