Parliament Question: Study of Rare and Unpublished Manuscripts

MINISTRY OF CULTURE LOK SABHA UNSTARRED QUESTION NO. 5841 ANSWERED ON 30.03.2026 Study of Rare and Unpublished Manuscripts 5841. Shri Naveen Jindal: Will the Minister of CULTURE be pleased to state: (a) whether the Government has any scheme to involve and acknowledge experts to study rare and unpublished manuscripts of ancient India; (b) if so, the details thereof; (c) whether it is a fact that 95 per cent of manuscripts related to ancient India knowledge remain unexplored by mainstream scholars; and (d) if so, the remedial steps taken by the Government therefor? ANSWER MINISTER OF CULTURE AND TOURISM (SHRI GAJENDRA SINGH SHEKHAWAT) (a) & (b) Gyan Bharatam Mission (GBM), announced during Union Budget 2025-26, is a flagship initiative of the Ministry of Culture (MoC), Government of India to undertake manuscripts related activities under various components including survey and registration of manuscripts, building robust technology infrastructure and partnership, documentation, preservation, conservation, digitization, publication of manuscripts and capacity building & research. The Mission, inter-alia, envisages engagement of domain expert to identify and categorize manuscripts collection for transcription, translation and publication with critical editions. (c) & (d) Manuscripts related to ancient India knowledge remain unexplored due to various reasons such as their dispersed presence in private collections and traditional institutions, lack of systematic cataloguing, limited accessibility, linguistic and script-related complexities, shortage of trained experts in manuscript studies etc. The remedial steps taken by the Government under GBM includes onboarding of institutions across the country to carry out above mentioned activities, engaging States / Union Territories (UTs) to act as Nodal Coordinating Authority for Gyan Bharatam implementation within the State / UT concerned, launch of National Manuscript Survey for identification, documenting and creating a comprehensive national database of manuscripts available with institutions, private individuals, scholars, mutts, temples, libraries and other repositories, onboarding of technical partners for various functions including metadata creation and its integration on National Digital Repository (NDR), deployment of equipments, AI-integrated digital platform and long-term data storage etc. ******