Indira Gandhi Rashtriya Manav Sangrahalaya, Bhopal promotes research and training for salvaging and revitalisation of important cultural traditions which are on the verge of extinction.
In this series, Sangrahalaya invited 24 trainees from 16 countries - Egypt, Ghana, Russia, Zimbabwe, Zambia, Sudan, Afghanistan, Sri-lanka, Uganda, Cambodia, Nepal, Cameroon, Congo, Malawi, Mauritius and Kenya, undergoing training at Human Settlement Management Institute, New Delhi for a special guided tour to IGRMS.
The programme was organised by Ministry of External Affairs and HUDCO. The trainees are senior Government functionaries of their respective countries, they were led by Surendra Singhai (General Manager, HUDCO) and VT Subramanian(Regional Manager, HUDCO, Bhopal) visited Indira Gandhi Rashtriya Manav Sangrahalaya for the first time.
The visit began with an interactive session with Prof Sarit Kumar Chaudhuri (Director, IGRMS) followed by screening of documentary on IGRMS and Hi tea. Director, IGRMS congratulated HUDCO for organising the training programme for senior bureaucrats. While interacting to them, he explained the idea and purpose of IGRMS.
The trainees visited Rock Art Shelter, various settlements of Tribal habitat and Veethi Sankul indoor exhibition building and understood the details of anthropology. The senior bureaucrats thanked him for the invitation for such cultural trip and promised to visit in the future as well. Aleksandra Pannikova from Russia said, “We will put efforts to develop a similar museum in our region. It is an impeccable reflection of Indian society, which cannot be compared.”
Norman Rugumya from Uganda thanked Ministry of External Affairs and said we request MoEA to organize more such programmes enabling us visit such cultural heritages of India.
Naro Rorn from Cambodia said, “Along with the materialistic goods we are also taking the life lessons and traditions of Indian culture with us. We will share it with our fellow countrymen”. On this occasion Safa Khalifa Khatier from Sudan said, “Manav Sangrahalaya is asset of Indian culture which teaches the lessons of unity and harmony.”
The senior engineers from various countries saw for the first time an open air museum displaying Habitats of different tribes and communities belonging to different topographical region at one place. They understood details about the cultural importance of the exhibits displayed in the museum from all over the country with special emphasis on Habitats.
With huge collections from all regions, the trainees were able to connect with the exhibits at different levels.