The Ministry of Culture, Government of India, and the Bibliotheque nationale de France (BnF), the National Library of France, signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) in Paris on October 26, 2026, to strengthen cooperation in the preservation, digitisation, research and dissemination of manuscript and documentary heritage, according to the official release.
Source: Ministry of Culture release via India Education Diary
The MoU was signed and exchanged under the Gyan Bharatam Mission by Vivek Aggarwal, Secretary, Ministry of Culture, Government of India, and Gilles Pecout, President of BnF, the release said.
Source: The NewsWire
The partnership brings together the Ministry of Culture, through Gyan Bharatam, the National Archives of India in New Delhi and the National Library in Kolkata, along with BnF. It sets up a framework for cooperation in five areas: digitisation, cross-sharing on the National Digital Repository, technology exchange, conservation, and research and development.
Source: Ministry of Culture release via India Education Diary
Under the agreement, the two sides will work to identify and digitise Indic-origin manuscripts and collections held by BnF, and will exchange expertise in digitisation and preservation technologies, cataloguing standards, OCR and handwritten-text-recognition tools for Indian scripts, digital humanities and manuscript conservation, according to the release.
Source: Observer Voice
Joint workshops, capacity-building programmes, research initiatives, publications, exhibitions and exchanges of scholars and experts are also envisaged under the partnership, the release said.
Source: The NewsWire
Gyan Bharatam is the Culture Ministry's flagship mission for the identification, documentation, conservation, digitisation, translation, research and dissemination of India's manuscript heritage.
Source: Ministry of Culture release via India Education Diary