Workshop on conservation of manuscripts held

 From Our Correspondent

 Silchar, April 4: The department of Bengali, Gurucharan College in collaboration with the tiol Mission for Manuscript under the Ministry of Culture organised a ten-day workshop on prevention and conservation of manuscripts here at Normal School recently. Scholars from various educatiol departments of this region participated in the workshop which is a first of its kind in the Northeast where more than 200 manuscripts of this region with rich historical values were preserved.

 The well-knonwn educationist and a researcher on folk culture of this region Amalendu Bhattacharjee said that credit should be given to Munmun Bhattacharjee, convener of the project who took the initiative to conduct the workshop which was later supported by GC College and NMM .

 Bhattacharjee pointed out that manuscript has its contribution in developing a language and history too get enriched with discovery of manuscripts. Barak Valley has its place in history and the culture of the country where finding and preserving the manuscripts of this region will develop the knowledge of life style and the folk of this place among the historians.

 P Gunindra, a famous researcher on manuscriptology from Manipur, subject expert of NMM Uran Chandra, Nobogopal Roy, associate professor at Sidho Kanho Birsha University, Purulia, Amalendu Bhattacharjee, Mithilesh Kumar, Pray Brahmachari, Uttam Roy, Amika Chakraborty were present at the workshop as resource persons.

 A good number of manuscripts were preserved here but due to lack of proper knowledge of preserving scripts has reduced and in this aspect the workshop is a successful attempt, he said.

 Amalendu Bhattacharjee said that this has to be a new beginning which will be successful with the cooperation of the people living in rural parts of the region. Most of the traditiol families have their take on the religious books like Ramaya, Masha Mangal and other mostly influenced by tive cultures.  Nobogopal Roy emphasized a descriptive cataloging of the manuscripts of the Northeast which according to his opinion will help the researcher of manuscripts world-wide to connect with this region.