Rediff: Digitizing Ancient Indian Manuscripts
The writer, Velany Fernandes, briefly spoke to me about some of the issues. Excerpts:
What are the Indian/ Indic/South Asian texts/resources available at your site?
While we do not have any complete ancient texts available oat Kamat's Potpourri,
we have a number
of manuscripts, epigraphs, and inscriptions from various time periods of Indian history. In addition
to classical texts, we have a huge collection of common artifacts.
Specifically, we have pictures from illustrated manuscripts of Shivattwanidhi, Ragamalika, Shivapurana,
Sougandhika Parinaya. We also have digitized pages of many palm-leaf texts.
How did you avail these texts and make them available online?
As researchers, my parents had access to some of these rare manuscripts, and my father had
photographed them from museums, university archives, and private collections. We have a systematic process to publish them on the Web.
Technology is often accused of taking present generations away from their
ancient texts/culture. How do you think this kind of technology can help bring ancient texts/culture
to the present generation?
Today's generation is losing interest in Indian culture not because of technology,
but because of lack of their interest in it.
I do not think that digitizing ancient texts will arouse interest in Indian heritage.
Some Ancient Manuscripts at Kamat.com
 Description of a Battle Notice the usage of both modern and ancient weapons |  |
 |  Sanskrit Palm-leaf Text 17th Century. Keladi Museum |
Mummadi Krishnaraja Wodeyar Illustration from Sougandhika Parinaya manuscript |  |
 | Mythical Figure from an Astrological Text The caption reads "Adhokundali" |
