By Pratap Chakravarty | AFP News
India kicked off celebrations on Saturday to mark the 150th anniversary of the birth of iconic poet and playwright Rabindranath Tagore, the first Asian to win the Nobel Prize for literature. Prime Minister Manmohan Singh launched the festivities for the poet who won the Nobel in 1913 and is revered by the world's 250 million Bengali speakers in India, neighbouring Bangladesh and elsewhere.
The events, planned over one year, aim to stir new interest among a wider audience in the Bengali writer's novels, music, plays, poems and paintings, the government said.
"A number of commemoration events have (also) been planned abroad, particularly in countries with which Tagore had some association," Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh said in a speech in New Delhi.
Tagore, who established an open-air university in India's West Bengal state, also penned the national anthems of both Bangladesh and India. He produced some 50 volumes of poetry including his acclaimed Gitanjali (Song Offerings).
Jorasanko Mansion in state capital Kolkata, the poet's birthplace and also where he died in 1941, was bedecked with flowers for the occasion.
In New Delhi, Singh, addressing diplomats and fans from India and Bangladesh, also announced an award in the name of the poet, who was part of a national campaign for India's independence from British colonial rule, granted in 1947.
"A jury headed by the prime minister will select each year a citizen of the world of outstanding public eminence who in his or her life and work epitomises the high universal ideals that Tagore stood for," Singh said.
The award will "recognise his very distinguished contributions towards the promotion of international brotherhood and fraternity", Singh said.
Tagore, who also spent time in what is now Bangladesh, renounced his British knighthood in protest over a massacre of hundreds of civilians by British-led troops in India's Jallianwala town in 1919.
Several states including Meghalaya and Tripura in India's remote northeast were also celebrating the event with seminars, plays and readings from Tagore's voluminous works, which for many mirror India's spiritual heritage.
Prime Minister Singh thanked his Bangladeshi counterpart, Sheikh Hasina, for jointly hosting the year-long celebrations.
He also released a digital collection of some of the poet's paintings which were on display at an exhibition in New Delhi.
The exhibition forms part of a broader joint series of events to mark the anniversary, which was launched on Friday in Dhaka by Indian Vice President Mohammed Hamid Ansari and Sheikh Hasina.
"Some important archival materials on Tagore that are on celluloid have been restored and packaged, for national and international dissemination, after sub-titling in English," Singh said.
The Archaeological Survey of India has helped authorities of Tagore's university -- Viswa Bharati -- in the restoration of 27 heritage buildings while the government is planning to upgrade museums linked to the poet.
Singh also said India's culture ministry has begun the digitaliation of Tagore's rare paintings and original manuscripts and books.
"But in the final analysis the future of Viswa Bharati depends not so much on official patronage or resources but the dreams and ambitions of its teachers, students and alumni," the prime minister added.
Tagore, known as the "Bard of the East," set up Vishwa Bharati in 1921 in the picturesque town of Shantiniketan near Kolkata from the prize money he received from the Nobel Foundation.
The events, planned over one year, aim to stir new interest among a wider audience in the Bengali writer's novels, music, plays, poems and paintings, the government said.
"A number of commemoration events have (also) been planned abroad, particularly in countries with which Tagore had some association," Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh said in a speech in New Delhi.
Tagore, who established an open-air university in India's West Bengal state, also penned the national anthems of both Bangladesh and India. He produced some 50 volumes of poetry including his acclaimed Gitanjali (Song Offerings).
Jorasanko Mansion in state capital Kolkata, the poet's birthplace and also where he died in 1941, was bedecked with flowers for the occasion.
In New Delhi, Singh, addressing diplomats and fans from India and Bangladesh, also announced an award in the name of the poet, who was part of a national campaign for India's independence from British colonial rule, granted in 1947.
"A jury headed by the prime minister will select each year a citizen of the world of outstanding public eminence who in his or her life and work epitomises the high universal ideals that Tagore stood for," Singh said.
The award will "recognise his very distinguished contributions towards the promotion of international brotherhood and fraternity", Singh said.
Tagore, who also spent time in what is now Bangladesh, renounced his British knighthood in protest over a massacre of hundreds of civilians by British-led troops in India's Jallianwala town in 1919.
Several states including Meghalaya and Tripura in India's remote northeast were also celebrating the event with seminars, plays and readings from Tagore's voluminous works, which for many mirror India's spiritual heritage.
Prime Minister Singh thanked his Bangladeshi counterpart, Sheikh Hasina, for jointly hosting the year-long celebrations.
He also released a digital collection of some of the poet's paintings which were on display at an exhibition in New Delhi.
The exhibition forms part of a broader joint series of events to mark the anniversary, which was launched on Friday in Dhaka by Indian Vice President Mohammed Hamid Ansari and Sheikh Hasina.
"Some important archival materials on Tagore that are on celluloid have been restored and packaged, for national and international dissemination, after sub-titling in English," Singh said.
The Archaeological Survey of India has helped authorities of Tagore's university -- Viswa Bharati -- in the restoration of 27 heritage buildings while the government is planning to upgrade museums linked to the poet.
Singh also said India's culture ministry has begun the digitaliation of Tagore's rare paintings and original manuscripts and books.
"But in the final analysis the future of Viswa Bharati depends not so much on official patronage or resources but the dreams and ambitions of its teachers, students and alumni," the prime minister added.
Tagore, known as the "Bard of the East," set up Vishwa Bharati in 1921 in the picturesque town of Shantiniketan near Kolkata from the prize money he received from the Nobel Foundation.
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