What is India Doing to Preserve its Manuscripts?

"A lot of kavya (poetry), charitra (biography), and darshana (philosophy) as well, which is unknown and needs to be known. Frankly, it will take the budget of a small European country to do all this," says Mumbai-based archaeological educationist Raamesh Gowri Raghavan, while talking about the preservation of India's manuscripts, the silent carriers of our civilisational memory, and the government’s latest effort to preserve them.

Announced in the Union Budget 2025-26, the Indian government came up with the 'Gyan Bharatam Mission', aiming to preserve manuscript heritage through a comprehensive strategy to survey, conserve, and digitise manuscripts. As per the announcements, it is likely to include creating a national digital repository, usage of AI to make the manuscripts accessible, and providing financial assistance to repositories, along and building expertise through training programs.

Recently, on October 25, the Union culture ministry signed a Memorandum of Understanding with 20 institutes across the country, including Asiatic Society Kolkata, University of Kashmir, Prayagraj's Hindi Sahitya Sammelan, along with Chennai's Governmental Oriental Manuscript Library, and others, for the conservation and upkeep of manuscripts digitally.

In the land of heritage

India is estimated to have 10 million manuscripts, said to be the largest collection in the world. However, several reports have also claimed that the numbers are as high as 40 million. The initiative has conserved 90 million folios of manuscripts. 

Established in February 2003, the National Mission for Manuscripts, under the Ministry of Tourism and Culture, has been seeking to "preserve the vast manuscript wealth of India", as per the mission's website, citing the country to possess an estimated five million manuscripts. Reportedly, these cover a variety of themes, textures and aesthetics, scripts, languages, calligraphies, illuminations and illustrations.

It also mentions that these "manuscripts lie scattered across the country and beyond, in numerous institutions as well as private collections, often unattended and undocumented", and that the mission "aims to locate, document, preserve and render these accessible to connect India's past with its future, its memory with its aspirations".

In the historical context, it has been reported that he seventh-century Chinese traveller Hiuen Tsang took back hundreds of manuscripts from India, and, in the late eighteenth century, the Nawab of Awadh presented a gift - an illuminated manuscript of the Padshahnama to King George III of England. The piece is considered the "finest" in the royal collection.

Coming to the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries, the first group of Orientalists included philologist and founder of the Asiatic Society of Bengal William Jones, scholar of Telugu C. P. Brown, traveller and Eastern language scholar John Leyden, the first Surveyor-General of India Colin Mackenzie, Sanskrit scholar Charles Wilkins, the translator of numerous Sanskrit works H. H. Wilson and the multi-faceted Orientalist H. T. Colebrook.

Taking an interest in the facets of the culture, they systematically studied and reflected on various aspects of the Indian sub-continent's civilisation. They carefully observed the culture found in the vast treasure of manuscripts on a variety of materials, like palm leaf, paper, cloth and even gold and silver. Their personal deposits can still be seen in different Indian as well as British libraries.

"Preservation of scripts like Modi, Kaithi, Tankri, Mahajani, Tigalari, Grantha etc. needs people to be educated in them and to become fluent in them. NMM and other private groups used to conduct workshops in these scripts for both academics and amateurs. Hopefully, the rebranded scheme will do the same," Raghavan says, citing that the new initiative is "rebranding" of the NMM while the "inadequate funding remains the same".

As of yet, the budget for the mission for the current financial year (2025–26) is an allocated budget of Rs. 60 crore which also includes digitisation efforts. However, as per various international studies conducted in the past for European manuscripts, the cost is likely to vary based on the resolution. The higher resolutions (e.g., 600 DPI vs. 400 DPI) with techniques like "overhead scanning" can increase costs. 

On the other hand, the condition of the manuscript, if in a fragile condition with increased human resources, technology, along with the number of manuscripts being digitised, can all have effects on the costing. 

What can be the roadblocks?

Cut to the present, the efforts are being claimed to be in full swing for the conservation through the key actions, including key actions like establishing digital repositories like Kriti Sampada, launching AI-powered challenges like Gyan-Setu for making heritage accessible to all. 

However, the process of preservation might not be that simple, notes Raghavan. "Preservation of manuscripts is very challenging as it has multiple dimensions," he says counting the first to be the physical preservation through deacidification, temperature and humidity control etc. "These are highly technical matters in which an entire army of professional conservators needs to be trained — and expensive facilities need to be built to house these fragile manuscripts."

Highlighting the emphasis on digitisation of the documents to make it accessible to people, which the educationist counts as another problem, he also says, "Third is the need to encourage objective, critical scholarship of these texts, not merely reading them and being delusional about being 'Vishwaguru'. There is much to learn in these manuscripts, but also much that is not scientific and now obsolete (e.g. astrology)."

India also holds various personal collections and heirlooms, and recovering the manuscripts from even the foreign museums and collections can be another challenge, he notes. However, there has not been a disclosure about possessing it from foreign lands in this initiative. 

Using Hindi words to explain the path to preservation, Raghavan opines, "The true mission of Gyan Bharatam can only succeed if the great Indian practices of criticism (ninda), analysis (samiksha), insight (tika), commentary (bhashya), explanation (vritti), and interpretation (vyakhyana), are fostered by creating an atmosphere of critical thinking, intellectual honesty, and academic freedom. If we consider these texts as sacred objects to be merely preserved in repositories and the ancestors who wrote these texts as beyond criticism (anindya), then there will be no Gyan in the Bharatam."

What is the potential in business and art alike? 

The preservation of the heritage manuscripts is also important as it can open up opportunities in a few segments and can include common citizens. It can further lead to the curated exhibitions that offers the collections for people to see and learn about them. 

Along with the government, even private libraries can be opened up that allow the accessibility to education, and content creation. On the other hand, the unique patterns, motifs, and imageries from manuscripts can help brands in fashion, decor and more to draw inspiration from their designs. Moreover, even cultural heritage tours can be organised around manuscript collections.