The unique Gallery curated by ASI showcases confiscated and retrieved antiquities for public

Retrieval of antiquities from abroad highest ever during last 5 years: Culture Minister Posted On: 31 AUG 2019 6:30PM by PIB Delhi The Minister of State for Culture & Tourism (Independent charge), Shri Prahlad Singh Patel inaugurated ‘Gallery of Confiscated and Retrieved Antiquities’ at Purana Qila in New Delhi today.

Curated by Archaeological Survey of India (ASI), the Gallery is located in the arched cells of Purana Qila and displays confiscated and retrieved antiquities to public.

Speaking to the media after tour of the gallery, Shri Prahlad Singh Patel said that it is a matter of pride that we have been able to retrieve the previous pieces of our heritage from abroad. The number of antiquities recovered in the last five years is the highest ever, he revealed. The Minister said that the credit goes to our Prime Minister who not only made efforts to help retrieve these antiquities but personally carried them back with him during his official tours abroad. The recent success is because of our continuously improving cultural relations with various countries of the world. The Minister lauded the tireless efforts of various government agencies like ASI, CBI , DRI among others in this endeavour.

The displayed heritage in the Gallery is a part of Central Antiquity Collection (CAC), located in Purana Qila which was created to house the antiquities explored and excavated by the ASI and also those antiquities which were retrieved and confiscated with the help of Ministry of External Affairs and various law enforcing agencies i.e. Police, CBI, Directorate of Revenue Intelligence and Custom officials. Presently, a total of 2,72,824 antiquities have been stored in the CAC out of which 4,144 are confiscated/retrieved antiquities.

The ‘Gallery of Confiscated and Retrieved Antiquities’ showcases a part display of 198 confiscated and retrieved antiquities belonging from ancient to modern period from the CAC collection. The exhibition also sensitizes the visitors about the illegal trade of precious heritage items and process and regulations for retrieving them.

Accordingly, the Gallery displays two parallel narratives which will provide a holistic understanding of the importance of repatriation of smuggled antiquities. One of the narratives establishes the larger context of the museum display including the importance of cultural heritage; laws governing our heritage; theft and trafficking of cultural items and the process of retrieval of smuggled antiquities, while the other narrative will focus on the intrinsic aesthetic qualities and iconography of the artifacts.

The display in the gallery ranges from proto-historic to modern period and affiliated to different provenances. The wide range of retrieved or confiscated antiquities includes stone and metal sculptures, coins, paintings, ivory and copper artifacts, architectural panels, etc. Some of the exclusive exhibits showcased in the gallery are Bronze sculptures of Parvati and Sridevi of Chola Period (brought back in 2016), Standing Buddha (returned by the Metropolitan Museum of Art in the year 1999), terracotta Mother Goddess of Mauryan period (brought back in the year 2016), Brahma-Brahmani (confiscated by Central Bureau of Investigation), Mithuna (seized in New York and brought back in the year 2010) and Kashmiri Harwan tile (returned to India by Consulate General of India, New York in the year 2016).

In the past, many of valuable antiquities, artifacts and sculptures have been stolen from India and are sold in foreign countries. As per the Antiquity and Art Treasures Act, 1972 and rules 1973, it is the duty of Archaeological Survey of India to stop theft, illegal export and regulates domestic trade of antiquities.

So far, ASI, has retrieved 44 stolen antiquities from USA, Australia, Singapore, Germany, Canada and England and 119 more antiquities are in the process of retrieval. Owing to the efforts of ASI no theft has been reported from any Centrally Protected Monument or site museum under ASI during last few years.

Evolve polices, strategies and missions for the generation of innovations and support systems for multiple applications,

Generate science and technology tasks in critical infrastructure, economic and social sectors in partnership with Government departments, institutions and industry, and Function as the Secretariat to the Scientific Advisory Committee to the Cabinet, with the Principal Scientific Adviser to the Government of India as its Chairman.

In discharging the above duties, the PSA’s Office has been actively promoting the implementation of synergy projects in various science and technology areas. Typically, the interventions by the PSA’s Office are made in the following distinct scenarios:

Policy and strategy initiatives; R&D activities that do not fall into the business of any single department; R&D activities that involve many departments and need to be synergized; Areas in which there are significant S&T gaps; and

Areas in which innovation possibilities are bright for deriving economic value or societal benefit from knowledge generated by research. The Office endeavors to bring in synergy among the various scientific departments and other ministries in creating an enabling S&T eco-system that encourages innovations across disciplines. It encourages R&D projects in `advanced high-quality basic research’, and `directed basic research’, as also ‘pre-competitive applied research’ through academia-industry interactions. The development of specific projects, usually in partnership with other departments, revolves around this basic philosophy.

Thus the ‘synergy projects’ of the office are focused to achieve the objectives – Evidence-based studies for policy and strategy initiatives; Development and pilot project efforts that can nucleate or catalyse multi-disciplinary projects or help in networking institutions with common goals; For enhancing national competitiveness; and

National security-related technologies. These projects are in consonance with national S&T priorities. The projects undertaken by this Office relate to the energy sector, water, automotive, machine tools, electronic hardware, photonics, medical devices, science initiatives in Ayurveda, and rural technologies, etc.

During the implementation of Smart Grid Pilot projects in State utilities, it was felt that smart grid efforts required urgent concerted focus for which it was necessary to create a comprehensive institutional arrangement capable of dedicating the manpower, resources and organizational attention needed to take it forward.

NSGM Establishment National Smart Grid Mission has been established by Govt. of India vide MoP Office Memorandum dated 27.03.2015 to accelerate Smart Grid deployment in India. NSGM has been in operational since January 2016 with dedicated team. NSGM has its own resources, authority, functional & financial autonomy to plan and monitor implementation of the policies and programs related to Smart Grids in the country.

Structure NSGM is housed under MoP considering the fact that most of the prominent stakeholders (DISCOMs, Regulators, Electrical Manufactures, CEA etc.) for Smart Grid are associated with MoP. Other concerned Ministries like MNRE and MoHI would also be associated with the mission. It is important to note that Smart Grid is a dynamic and evolving concept due to constant technological innovations. Therefore, the objectives, structure and functioning of NSGM is sketched so as to allow sufficient freedom and flexibility of operations without needing to refer the matter to different Ministries / Agencies frequently

NSGM functions with three tier hierarchical structure as follows: 1st Level – Governing Council, headed by Minister of Power. 2nd Level – Empowered Committee, headed by Secretary (Power). Supportive Level – Technical Committee, headed by Chairperson CEA. 3rd Level – NSGM Project Management Unit.

The NSGM Project Management Unit (NPMU) is headed by the Director NPMU. The Director NPMU is the Member of the Governing Council and Empowered Committee, and Member Secretary of Technical Committee. NPMU is the implementing agency for operationalizing the Smart Grid activities in the country under the guidance of Governing Council and Empowered Committee.

Corresponding to the NSGM Project Management Unit at national level, each of the States will also have a State Level Project Management Unit (SLPMU) which would be chaired by the Power Secretary of the State. The administrative / operation and maintenance expenses in this regard would be borne by respective States. NSGM will provide support for training & capacity building to SLPMUs for smart grid activities.

The Smart Grid Knowledge Centre (SGKC) being developed by POWERGRID with funding from MoP will act as a Resource Centre for providing technical support to the Mission in all technical matters, including development of technical manpower, capacity building, outreach, suggesting curriculum changes in technical education etc. Possibility will also be explored for bilateral and multilateral financial support from various national and international agencies in this regard. The SGKC shall undertake programs and activities envisaged for it as per the guidance from NPMU.

The National Mission for Manuscripts was established in February 2003, by the Ministry of Tourism and Culture, Government of India. A unique project in its programme and mandate, the Mission seeks to unearth and preserve the vast manuscript wealth of India. India possesses an estimate of ten million manuscripts, probably the largest collection in the world. These cover a variety of themes, textures and aesthetics, scripts, languages, calligraphies, illuminations and illustrations.

The Mission has the mandate of identifying, documenting, conserving and making accessible the manuscript heritage of India. We see a national effort in the form of a mission for manuscripts as a logical, radical and urgent response to a very contemporary challenge- of reclaiming the inheritance contained in manuscripts, often in a poor state of preservation.

National Mission for Manuscripts is a National level comprehensive initiative which caters to the need of conserving manuscripts and disseminating knowledge contained therein. NMM is working towards fulfilling its motto, ‘conserving the past for the future’. It has emerged as a movement, undoubtedly the most popular and effective among all the heritage conservation initiatives in the country.

Western Regional Power Committee (WRPC) comprising of States of Chhattisgad, Gujarat, Madhya Pradesh, Maharashtra and Goa and Union Territory of Daman & Diu and Dadra and Nagar Haveli.

Chairperson of the WRPC would represent the States of Western Region by rotation. Term of the Chairperson would be for a period of one year.

Member Secretary, WRPC is the Convener of WRPC. Functions of WRPC... 1 To facilitate the stability and smooth operation of the integrated grid and economy & efficiency in the operation of power system in the region, the following are the functions of WRPC:

To undertake Regional Level operation analysis for improving grid performance. To facilitate inter-state/inter-regional transfer of power. To facilitate all functions of planning relating to inter-state/ intra-state transmission system with CTU / STU.

To coordinateplanning of maintenance of generating machines of various generating companies of the region including those of inter-state generating companies supplying electricity to the Region on annual basis and also to undertake review of maintenance programme on monthly basis.

To undertake planning of outage of transmission system on monthly basis. To undertake operational planning studies including protection studies for stable operation of the grid. To undertake planning for maintaining proper voltages through review of reactive compensation requirement through system study committee and monitoring of installed capacitors.

To evolve consensus on all issues relating to economy and efficiency in the operation of power system in the region.

The decision of WRPC arrived at by consensus regarding operation of the Western Regional Grid and scheduling and dispatch of electricity will be followed by WRLDC subject to directions of the Central Commission, if any.

In addition to the above, the CERC has entrusted the following functions to Member Secretary, WRPC/WRPC Secretariat under IEGC /various Regulations:

Preparation of Regional Energy Accounts. Preparation of Weekly UI & Reactive Energy Accounts.

For the purpose of payment of transmission charges/capacity charges and incentive, certify: (a) Availability of Regional AC and HVDC transmission system. (b) Availability and PLF for ISGS (Thermal). (c) Capacity index for ISGS (Hydro).

To resolve the grievances in matter related to Open Access in inter-state transmission. Periodic inspection of under frequency relays. Preparation and review of Annual Outage plans of generation.