Granted: Japan reiterates support for preservation of Pakistan’s heritage

Gives digital equipment worth Rs51m to Lok Virsa under its grant-in-aid programme

ISLAMABAD:

The government of Japan reiterated its support for the promotion and preservation of Pakistan’s folk heritage by donating state-of-the-art audiovisual equipment to Lok Virsa.

Japanese Ambassador Hiroshi Inomata handed over the equipment to the Lok Virsa administration at a ceremony at the organisation’s media centre on Monday. Federal Minister for Information, Broadcasting and National Heritage Pervez Rasheed also attended the ceremony.

The equipment includes studio high-definition digital video recording and editing equipment, a field recording unit and a video projection and display unit, altogether worth ¥49 million (Rs50.8 million), according to the Japanese embassy.

The equipment will help in the audiovisual documentation of Pakistani folk culture and heritage, according to Lok Virsa officials.

Ambassador Inomata said he has found Pakistan’s historical monuments and heritage sites to be impressive during his travels around the country and said the government is doing a commendable job to make people aware of Pakistani culture.



“This grant from the Japan government and the people of Japan will surely contribute towards preservation of folk and traditional culture of Pakistan,” the ambassador said.

Minister Rasheed thanked the Japan government for its grant for Lok Virsa and said investment in culture is linked with promotion and protection of culture heritage.

Rasheed said the government is determined to support all projects that benefit the country’s rural communities, especially folk artists and craftspeople.

“This is the path towards global peace and this is the path through which we can defeat those want to eliminate our rich cultural pluralism and diversity,” he said.

Mitsuyoshi Kawasaki, the chief representative of the Japan International Cooperation Agency in Pakistan, said an ongoing joint institutional cooperation programme between Japan and Lok Virsa was launched in 2012 to mark the 60th anniversary of Pak-Japan bilateral ties.

The handover ceremony also marks 60 years of cooperation between JICA and the Pakistani government, Kawasaki said.

He said the equipment will help achieve four objectives — enriching collection and dissemination of folk culture, integrating cultural diversity for achievement of national peace, supporting folk artists and artisans, and accomplishing excellence in academic and research fields with the help of documented audiovisual records.

The equipment is the third grant in aid the Japanese government has given Lok Virsa. Previous grants in 1987 and in 1994 helped in installing the studio, a control room and analogue recording equipment.

Shahera Shahid, the executive director of Lok Virsa, said the previous Japanese grants and equipment enabled Lok Virsa to record 12 hours of video and 3,500 hours of audio.

Shahid said the media centre at the Lok Virsa executes audiovisual documentation of Pakistani culture including recording of oral traditions and performing arts.

The ceremony ended with a cultural programme featuring performances by rubab player Zafar Ali, alghoza player Akbar Khamiso Khan and a Balochi troupe that included singer Akhtar Channal. The performances were recorded using the new equipment.

Lok Virsa is a government-run institution that also runs a heritage museum, a sound archive, a research centre and a museum.

Published in The Express Tribune, February 4^th, 2014.