Indira Gandhi Rashtriya Manav Sangrahalaya (National ... - IGRMS

286 Multiple Heritage: Role of Specialised Museums in India
in his concept paper (1972) that a full-fledged ‘Museum of Man’ should have
major sections knitted together of geology, zoology, prehistory, physical
anthropology, social and cultural anthropology, folk and tribal arts, human
geography, economic and social development disciplines. ‘The concept, he said,
‘does not mean a multipurpose museum of the twenties (20 th century) which was
a conglomeration of different departments, each opening its own separate shop
under a single huge roof ’ (Roy: 1972, 27-28). The Plan-Outline on the National
Museum Man (NMM), published by the Director, Anthropological Survey of
India (1977) had demanded the need of setting up a new kind of museum with
emphasis on putting objects in the living human context, and of portraying the
general flow of life of the common people, shaped by socio-economic forces in
the historical perspectives, apart from noting the high water marks of creativity
in different historical periods. It also stressed the need to develop integrated
vision of human life rather than segmented pictures, determined by artificial
boundaries of different disciplines.
In 1987, two years after the Museum was converted into an Autonomous
Organisation, a Project Report was prepared during the tenure of R.S. Negi as
Director, which listed a perspective plan of display in the indoor galleries and
outdoor exhibitions, under three broad themes of human evolution, variation,
and patterns of culture. It stressed inter-institutional collaboration, research and
collection of objects from fast vanishing or changing communities. This Project
Report and the perspective plan were discussed in the 4 th meeting of the Executive
Council on 25 th July 1987 which resolved on a committee of experts to discuss
and rewrite the Project Report. In a comment (1994) on the developments in the
Museum from mid-1987 to 1993, it was pointed out by K. S. Singh, former
Director-General of Anthropological Survey of India and National Museum of
Man that, designed originally to explore the anthropological, biological, linguistic
and cultural dimensions of all the people of India in a holistic manner, and the
evolution of their civilization, the Museum was reduced to a tribal museum,
stressing the tribal material only. However, it may be stated that the active
involvement of the tribal communities in making the open-air exhibition on ‘Tribal
Habitat’ certainly makes a departure from the traditional concept of museum
and display.
A further ‘conceptual approach’ was developed by a Programme Committee
under the chairmanship of J. Swaminathan, then President, RMSS and presented
in the 16 th meeting of the Executive Council (1992). This note questioned the
conventional approach of ethnological museums, tied to only tribal and analogous
cultures, and to the portrayal of remnants of such cultures with an underlying
assumption that these were ‘dead’ or ‘dying’. It asked for a synchronic view of
different cultures, with an accent of the temporal and spatial continuum of the
world of culture. It also asked for depiction of man’s relationships with other
human beings, with time and space, nature and culture, allowing for a to and fro