UNESCO to launch video encyclopedia of India on the web

NEW DELHI: UNESCO plans to have a video encyclopedia of India on the web to effectively capture the cultural diversity of India by depicting rituals and performing arts among other things.

The site, www.indiavideo.org, will highlight the unique culture, heritage and geography of India. The contents of the site will be developed by a private organisation, Invis Multimedia, a premier content development organisations specialising in audio-visual production.

Announcing the agreement between Unesco and Invis Multimedia here on Sunday, Unesco New Delhi director Minja Yang said, “India is a vast country with an extraordinarily ancient and diverse cultural heritage. The unique objective behind this project is to develop an atlas of India that covers not just its geographical features but its cultural ones too. We are very pleased to partner with Invis Multimedia in the creation of a format that is easily accessible world-wide and that will raise awareness of the importance of safeguarding India’s heritage.”

The encyclopedia will have detailed sections on each state and Union Territory of India. The video clips will be supplemented with text in English language. Kerala will be the first state to be covered, with two thousand professionally created video clips, which are to be uploaded by March 2008.