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New Delhi:
Mahatma Gandhi's diary written during the year of Indian
Independence and held till recently under private possession will
soon be open for public viewing at the National Archives here.
The
small diary handwritten by the Bapu in Gujarati is among a
collection of other letters and documents handed over to the
Archives by Varsha Das, former director of the Gandhi National
Museum.
"We received Gandhi's diary 10 days back along with a collection of
other documents from Varsha Das, the former director of the Gandhi
National Museum," Rajesh Verma, Assistant Director, National
Archives of India told PTI. Meena Jain, a childhood friend of Das
had handed over to her, Gandhi's diary and other documents
containing letters and several diaries written by Manu Behn, the
niece of Mahatma Gandhi.
"I handed over the collection to the Archives in the first week of
July as we do not display the original diary and documents at the
Museum. Also, the Archives has the facility of temperature control
that is suitable for the preservation of the diary whose pages are
in a fragile condition," Das told PTI.
The worn and yellow pages of the diary dated between April 13 to
December 29, 1947 has detailed jottings by the late leader mostly in
blue ink with also several entries in pencil all in Gujarati." The
diary is a national as well as a world's treasure. By keeping it in
the Archives one will get to know a little more about Mahatma
Gandhi's life and work than what we know at present," says Das.
Apart from Gandhi''s diary the collection received by the National
Archives contains 19 diaries written by Gandhi's niece Manu Behn
along with several assorted pages with bangla alphabets, pencil
notes written in Hindi, Urdu and Gujarati as well as some illegible
writings, a source at the National Archives told PTI.
"The 19 diaries by Gandhi's niece contain her writings as well as
several letters as old as 1944 that are addressed to her by Zakir
Hussain, Indira Gandhi and other leaders and freedom fighters," adds
the source. The entire collection would be kept in ten folders in a
chronological order at the Archives. Varsha Das, who was also
formerly Director, The National Book Trust says, "A lot will be
revealed through these diaries." The Archives would laminate and
produce a digitised version of the Gandhi's diary which is expected
to benefit researchers and scholars, she adds.
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