Jaishankar opens Nirāmayatā exhibition on South Asian healing texts in Delhi
Representative image: DariuszSankowski / Pixabay
S. Jaishankar opened the Nirāmayatā exhibition on healing in South Asian texts at Delhi's India International Centre on October 12, 2026.
What Happened
External Affairs Minister S. Jaishankar on Monday, October 12, 2026, inaugurated an exhibition titled "Nirāmayatā: Healing and Wellbeing in South Asian Texts and Practices" at the India International Centre (IIC) in New Delhi. The exhibition, held in the IIC's art gallery in the Kamaladevi Complex, draws on the manuscript traditions of the Indian subcontinent to show how healing and wellbeing were understood and practised. Speaking at the opening, Jaishankar highlighted the role of the Samhita Initiative in preserving, documenting and making these manuscript traditions accessible, and pointed to artificial intelligence as a tool that could help restore manuscripts and widen access to them.
Key Facts
- The exhibition "Nirāmayatā: Healing and Wellbeing in South Asian Texts and Practices" was inaugurated on October 12, 2026.
- It is being held at the India International Centre, New Delhi, in the art gallery of the Kamaladevi Complex.
- External Affairs Minister S. Jaishankar opened the exhibition.
- He credited the Samhita Initiative with work to preserve, document and make accessible manuscript traditions of the subcontinent.
- He described the show as more than a medical exhibition, presenting a civilisational view of how the individual, society and the natural world relate to one another.
- He said artificial intelligence could be used to preserve, restore and improve access to manuscripts.
- The IIC's programme lists related seminars from October 6, linked to the same theme.
Why It Matters
The scale of the material is vast. A national manuscript survey launched by the Ministry of Culture in March 2026 under the Gyan Bharatam Mission has recorded more than 1.19 crore manuscripts so far, according to the ministry. Many survive only as fragile single copies written in a range of scripts and languages. An exhibition built around texts on healing brings one strand of this little-seen body of knowledge into public view.
The title itself, Nirāmayatā, refers to a state of freedom from illness, and the framing goes beyond treatment. By presenting healing as part of a wider relationship between people, their communities and their environment, the exhibition reflects a theme found across many South Asian traditions: that wellbeing is about balance, not only the absence of disease. That idea is also part of today's interest in Ayurveda, Yoga and other traditional systems.
Jaishankar's emphasis on documentation and access is significant. A manuscript that cannot be found, read or studied is of little use to scholars, doctors or the public. Cataloguing, digitising and translating these texts is slow, specialised work, and it is an area where new tools, including AI for reading damaged pages and difficult scripts, could speed things up. The involvement of the foreign minister also signals that the government sees this heritage as part of India's cultural diplomacy, given that these traditions are shared across South Asia.
| Nirāmayatā exhibition | Detail |
|---|---|
| Opened | October 12, 2026 |
| Venue | Art Gallery, Kamaladevi Complex, India International Centre, New Delhi |
| Inaugurated by | External Affairs Minister S. Jaishankar |
| Theme | Healing and wellbeing in South Asian texts and practices |
| Linked effort | Samhita Initiative on manuscript preservation |
Impact
Short-term: Visitors to the IIC can see how South Asian texts and practices approached health, and the exhibition adds to public discussion on manuscript conservation.
Long-term: Greater attention to documenting and digitising medical manuscripts could make this material available to researchers, practitioners of traditional medicine and students.
Who is affected: Scholars of Indian knowledge systems and medical history, manuscript conservators, practitioners of traditional medicine, and members of the public interested in heritage.
Key Takeaway
S. Jaishankar opened the Nirāmayatā exhibition on South Asian healing texts at Delhi's India International Centre on October 12, stressing manuscript preservation and the role AI can play in it.
Questions and Answers
What is the Nirāmayatā exhibition about?
It explores how healing and wellbeing were understood in South Asian texts and practices, drawing on the manuscript traditions of the Indian subcontinent.
Where and when did it open?
It opened on October 12, 2026, at the art gallery in the Kamaladevi Complex of the India International Centre in New Delhi.
What did S. Jaishankar say at the opening?
He highlighted the Samhita Initiative's work to preserve, document and make manuscripts accessible, and said artificial intelligence could help restore manuscripts and widen access to them.
Why does preserving medical manuscripts matter?
These texts record centuries of knowledge about health. Without cataloguing, digitising and translation, they remain inaccessible to researchers, practitioners and the public, and fragile copies risk being lost.
Disclaimer: Prepared by the Peepals newsroom from publicly available sources with AI assistance. Information is accurate to the best of our knowledge at the time of publication and may change. Images may be representative. Not professional advice. Report an error via our contact page.
Sourced and fact-checked by the Peepals Global Editorial Team
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Reported, fact-checked and published by the Peepals Global Editorial Team.
