Gyan Bharatam Mission

Prime Minister Narendra Modi is set to inaugurate the newly restructured National Manuscripts Mission, now renamed as the “Gyan Bharatam Mission,” on June 9, 2025.

Overview of Gyan Bharatam Mission

The Gyan Bharatam Mission is a major national initiative spearheaded by the Ministry of Culture, Government of India. Its primary goal is to identify, document, preserve, and digitize the extensive manuscript legacy of India.
This initiative enhances and modernizes the earlier National Mission for Manuscripts (NMM), which was launched in 2003 and operates through the Indira Gandhi National Centre for the Arts (IGNCA).

Mission Objectives

• To systematically identify, catalogue, conserve, and digitize over 10 million manuscripts held in educational institutions, museums, libraries, and private collections throughout India.
• To develop a National Digital Repository focused on Indian Knowledge Systems, making ancient texts widely available to scholars, educators, and the global public.

Salient Features of the Gyan Bharatam Mission

• Extensive Reach: Aims to cover over one crore manuscripts, marking it as India’s most ambitious manuscript preservation effort to date.
• Digital Access: Will establish a centralized digital platform featuring traditional knowledge content, equipped with AI-assisted tools for tagging, archiving, and translation.
• Collaborative Approach: Involves partnerships with universities, museums, libraries, individual collectors, and global institutions to promote research and preservation.
• Scientific Techniques: Incorporates advanced conservation technologies, including artificial intelligence and 3D scanning, for restoration and digital preservation.
• Enhanced Funding: The mission’s financial support has been significantly increased—from ₹3.5 crore to ₹60 crore—with a total budget of ₹482.85 crore allocated for the 2024–2031 period.
• Global Accessibility: Manuscripts will be made available for educational and research purposes worldwide, promoting broader access to India’s intellectual heritage.

Understanding Manuscripts

Manuscripts are handwritten texts produced on materials such as paper, palm leaves, or tree bark, typically over 75 years old, and hold significant scientific, cultural, or artistic value.
An example is the Bakhshali Manuscript, an ancient Indian text on mathematics written on birch bark and dating back to the 3rd or 4th century BCE. This manuscript is notable for containing the earliest recorded use of the numeral ‘zero’.