New Delhi
Vice President M. Hamid Ansari has said that educating our youth about the value of our pluralistic heritage is the best way to ensure that our heritage is preserved. He was addressing an event to mark the celebration of World Heritage Day, organized by the Indian Trust for Rural Heritage and Development, here today. The former Chief Minister of Delhi, Smt. Sheila Dikshit and other dignitaries were present on the occasion.
The Vice President said that Indian culture is distinguished from others in respect of its continuity and heterogeneity, its accommodating ethos and its composite, plural character. He further said that India has played host to cultural streams from different parts of the world. In the course of time they were assimilated and adapted to life in India, he added.
Cultures cannot be separated from the societies in which they emerge, develop and, at times, decline and are subsumed by other cultures or fade away altogether. Cultural boundaries are diffuse but the term “tradition” or “culture” can easily lend itself to idea of a single society and its temporal, linear extant. Tradition, and culture, linked as they are to the idea of identity can also be construed to denote exclusivity, which can be troublesome.
The Vice President said that few people celebrate diversity and plurality the way India does and despite this diversity, people in India have lived in harmony for centuries and will continue to do so. He further said that the diversity of Indian cultural landscape is a result of not just toleration of newer and different elements, but of its acceptance. There may be reason to believe that the current tide of globalization would not submerge the Indian cultural identity but would add an Indian dimension to a globalizing culture, he added.
Post a Comment