'Gandhipedia' to sensitize youth: FM Nirmala Sitharaman

The National Council for Science Museums (NCSM), based in Kolkata, is developing a Gandhipedia “to sensitize” youth and society “at large” about positive Gandhian values, Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman announced while presenting the Union Budget for 2019-20 in Parliament on Friday.

“The 150th birth anniversary of Mahatma Gandhi is an apt occasion for us to re-dedicate ourselves to the ideals of Mahatma Gandhi,” she said.

The Minister, however, did not share more details on 'Gandhipedia' project of the NCSM, which functions under the Union Culture Ministry.

This comes about 10 months after President Ram Nath Kovind launched a web portal http://gandhi.gov.in/ to provide people with free access to an online repository of Gandhian literature, philosophy, audios, videos and rare photographs of the Father of the Nation.

The 'Gandhipedia', a section in the web portal, offers people free access to as many as 100 volumes of the collected works of Mahatma Gandhi.

The BJP was at the receiving end of the Gandhi-Godse controversy during the Lok Sabha polls after party's candidate from Bhopal and Malegaon blast case accused Pragya Thakur hailed the assassin of Mahatma as “patriot.”

While several BJP leaders backed Pragya, Prime Minister Narendra Modi strongly disapproved her remarks as a huge political controversy kicked in. Pragya won the Lok Sabha election defeating her rival Congress candidate Digvijay Singh with a huge margin of votes.

In her budget speech, the Finance Minister said the government was developing 17 iconic tourism sites into “world class” tourist destinations and to serve as “a model” for other tourism sites.

“The iconic tourism sites would enhance visitor experience which would lead to increase visits of both domestic and international tourists at these destinations,” she added.

With the objective of preserving “rich” tribal cultural heritage, a digital repository was also being developed where documents, folk songs, photos and videos on their evolution, place of origin, lifestyle, architecture, education level, traditional art, folk dances and other anthropological details of the tribes in India would be stored, the minister said.

“The repository will further be enriched and strengthened,” she added.