Droupadi Murmu Inaugurates Granth Kutir Library at Rashtrapati Bhavan

Key facts

• President Droupadi Murmu inaugurated Granth Kutir, a library housing 2,300 books and manuscripts at Rashtrapati Bhavan.
• The library features reading material in 11 Indian classical languages: Tamil, Sanskrit, Kannada, Telugu, Malayalam, Odia, Marathi, Pali, Prakrit, Assamese, and Bengali.
• The collection includes approximately 50 manuscripts handwritten on traditional materials such as palm leaf, paper, bark, and cloth.
• The initiative aligns with the Gyan Bharatam Mission of the Union government to preserve, digitise, and disseminate India’s manuscript heritage.
• The Indira Gandhi National Centre for the Arts (IGNCA) provided professional expertise for the conservation, documentation, and display of the manuscripts.
• The library replaces colonial-era works, including the speeches of Lord Curzon and works of William Hogarth, which have been relocated within the estate.
• The Rashtrapati Bhavan recently established Param Vir Dirgha, a gallery featuring portraits of 21 Param Vir Chakra awardees to replace portraits of British Aide-De-Camps.