India, France sign MoU on preserving written heritage

KOLKATA: The Union Ministry of Culture and National Library of France have entered into an MoU under which the two countries would cooperate in conservation, development and publicity of written heritage at the National Library.

"The collaboration will enable both countries to benefit not only in terms of capacity building on man power but also in terms of technology transfer and exchange of expertise," Joint Secretary, Ministry of Culture Sreya Guha said after the signing of the MoU today.

The signing was attended by the National Library of France President Bruno Racine.

"While we have expertise in the preservation of manuscripts, they have started digitisation a long ago which would benefit us," Guha said.

Under the MoU, the two countries would collaborate in preserving, identifying and publicising written heritage and iconographies heritage, she said.

The two countries would also share expertise such as description of Indian manuscripts in Sanskrit and Tamil

It would also help in the development of digital co-operation, sharing of technical and other expertise, competency and skill-building and cultural co-operation between both the countries, Guha stated.

New Consul-General of France in Kolkata Damien Syed and Director General of National Library Arun Kumar Chakraborty were also present on the occasion.

A programme on digitisation of old manuscripts and documents was started in France seven years ago.

"The newly signed agreement will make it possible for gaining their experience and high -quality expertise in this field," Guha said.

The Ministry of Culture has also emphasised on the project of building a National Virtual Library of India.