04-02-2007, 10:39 PM
<b>India seeks inclusion of Rig Veda manuscripts in UNESCO</b><!--QuoteBegin-->QUOTE<!--QuoteEBegin-->India has sought the inclusion of 30 manuscripts of the Rig Veda, kept at the Bhandarkar Oriental Research Institute, Pune, in UNESCOâs Memory of the World Register (MOW).
The manuscript collection at the institute has in the recent past been subjected to threat under public vandalism, provoked by some political organisations,the physical condition of the manuscript is already poor with brittleness and edges of pages cracking in some.
In view of the perilous state of documentary heritage worldwide, UNESCO established the MOW programme in 1992 with the vision that the worldâs documentary heritage belongs to all and should be fully preserved and protected and "be permanently accessible to all without hindrance".
It thus facilitates preservation by the most appropriate techniques, assists universal access and increases awareness worldwide of the existence and significance of documentary heritage.
India has sought the nomination of Rigveda as "one of the wonders of the world" because it has "preserved for us intact ,not only a vibrant expression of human imagination ,aspiration, ambition and ideology more than three thousand years old but also the aesthetics of expression in terms of sound, intonation and accent".
A collection of poems, prayers and songs sung by the Aryans mainly in praise of nature and its bounty,in all its various manifestation, Rigveda is the oldest among the four Vedas traditionally regarded as the pillars of Indian culture,it said in the nomination.
This collection of Rigveda manuscript is unique owing to the fact that it contains at least five manuscripts which have preserved the complete text of the Rigveda which belongs to antiquity and certainly not later than the second millennium Before Christ Era.
Thirteen manuscripts in this collection contain one of the oldest available commentaries on the text, a valuable aid to interpret the Rigveda. Five manuscripts also provide the traditional word analysis of the text "Padapatha". But for these aids understanding the text of the Rigveda would have been quite difficult.
Language of parts of the Rigveda proves indisputably that it is the oldest text available to us in any part of the world, itn added.
So important was this collection in interpreting and understanding the ancient literary work the Rigveda that the great Indologist Prof.F. Max Muller himself used one of the complete manuscripts in this collection for his pioneering translation of the complete text and commentary in 1849.
The collection consists of a rare manuscript written in Sharada script in vogue during medieval period in Kashmir and birch bark procured from Kashmir where no such manuscript is available now.
Indiaâs nomination form has been filed on behalf of the Mission Director National Mission for Manuscripts Sudha Goapalakrishnan and honorary secretary of Bhandarkar Oriental Research Institute, Pune, MG Dadphale.
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The manuscript collection at the institute has in the recent past been subjected to threat under public vandalism, provoked by some political organisations,the physical condition of the manuscript is already poor with brittleness and edges of pages cracking in some.
In view of the perilous state of documentary heritage worldwide, UNESCO established the MOW programme in 1992 with the vision that the worldâs documentary heritage belongs to all and should be fully preserved and protected and "be permanently accessible to all without hindrance".
It thus facilitates preservation by the most appropriate techniques, assists universal access and increases awareness worldwide of the existence and significance of documentary heritage.
India has sought the nomination of Rigveda as "one of the wonders of the world" because it has "preserved for us intact ,not only a vibrant expression of human imagination ,aspiration, ambition and ideology more than three thousand years old but also the aesthetics of expression in terms of sound, intonation and accent".
A collection of poems, prayers and songs sung by the Aryans mainly in praise of nature and its bounty,in all its various manifestation, Rigveda is the oldest among the four Vedas traditionally regarded as the pillars of Indian culture,it said in the nomination.
This collection of Rigveda manuscript is unique owing to the fact that it contains at least five manuscripts which have preserved the complete text of the Rigveda which belongs to antiquity and certainly not later than the second millennium Before Christ Era.
Thirteen manuscripts in this collection contain one of the oldest available commentaries on the text, a valuable aid to interpret the Rigveda. Five manuscripts also provide the traditional word analysis of the text "Padapatha". But for these aids understanding the text of the Rigveda would have been quite difficult.
Language of parts of the Rigveda proves indisputably that it is the oldest text available to us in any part of the world, itn added.
So important was this collection in interpreting and understanding the ancient literary work the Rigveda that the great Indologist Prof.F. Max Muller himself used one of the complete manuscripts in this collection for his pioneering translation of the complete text and commentary in 1849.
The collection consists of a rare manuscript written in Sharada script in vogue during medieval period in Kashmir and birch bark procured from Kashmir where no such manuscript is available now.
Indiaâs nomination form has been filed on behalf of the Mission Director National Mission for Manuscripts Sudha Goapalakrishnan and honorary secretary of Bhandarkar Oriental Research Institute, Pune, MG Dadphale.
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