Ministry of Culture implements “Global Engagement Scheme" to promote India's rich cultural heritage internationally and enhance India's global image.

The key Scheme objective include strengthening cultural ties with foreign nations, promoting bilateral cultural contacts, projecting India’s cultural identity on the world stage and encouraging inbound tourism.

The Global Engagement Scheme is administered through Indian Missions abroad to achieve its objective through following components:

1. Festival of India:

The artists practicing Indian art forms, are given opportunity to perform abroad under the banner of ‘Festival of India’. The artists from diverse cultural fields such as Folk Art including Folk Music, Folk Dance, Folk Theatre & Puppetry, Classical and Traditional Dance, Experimental/Contemporary Dance, Classical/Semi Classical Music, Theatre etc. perform in the ‘Festivals of India’ abroad.

2. Grant in aid to Indo Foreign Friendship Cultural Societies:

Grant in aid is released to Indo Foreign Friendship Cultural Societies actively functioning in foreign counties through our Indian Missions with the object of fostering closer friendship and cultural contacts between India and foreign country concerned.

As per its mandate, Indian Council of Cultural Relations (ICCR), an autonomous organization under Ministry of External Affairs (MEA), is promoting Indian culture worldwide through its cultural centres and Missions/Posts abroad. Activities conducted by them include inter-alia, teaching of Yoga, Dance, Music (vocal and instrumental), exchanging visual arts exhibitions, celebrating International Day of Yoga and Indian festivals. 

Ministry of Culture uses various Digital Media and social media platforms for promotion of Indian Culture.

The ICCR, MEA has developed (i) AIMS (Activity Information Management System) Portal   to centralize and streamline its global operations, facilitating seamless coordination between ICCR, Indian Cultural Centres and Indian missions/posts worldwide: (ii) A2A (Admission 2 Alumni) Portal for simplifying the application and admission process for foreign students aspiring to study in India; and (iii) Gyan Setu application   aiming to streamline and to automate the release of scholarship dues to students and universities. ICCR effectively leverages social media to amplify India’s soft power and promote cultural diplomacy on a global scale. ICCR also manages the official website of ICCR, which serves as a one-stop destination for all information related to ICCR’s activities and initiatives.

ICCR launched an online platform “Universalization of Traditional Indian Knowledge Systems (UTIKS) " for short but specialized courses on Traditional Indian Knowledge as a single window source of an introductory knowledge on Indian culture, ancient Indian texts ranging from

the Vedas & the Upanishads, a wide range of spiritual, philosophical, scientific, technical and artistic source to the uninitiated as well as help introduce Indian culture in a nuanced manner to those who have already basic understanding but would look for a deeper appreciation of diverse Indian traditions.

This information was given by Union Minister for Culture and Tourism Shri Gajendra Singh Shekhawat in a written reply in Rajya Sabha today.

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Sunil Kumar Tiwari

pibculture[at]gmail[dot]com

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