Kapila Vatsyayan was a leading scholar of Indian classical dance, art, architecture, and art history. She served as a member of parliament and bureaucrat in India, and also served as the founding director of the Indira Gandhi National Centre for the Arts.
Ratan Parimoo, born in Kashmir, is an art historian, art educator, pedagogue, artist and former director of the Lalbhai Dalpatbhai Museum, Ahmedabad. Ratan Parimoo was one of the founder members of Baroda Group.
Anjolie Ela Menon is one of India's leading contemporary artists. Her paintings are in several major collections, including the NGMA, the Chandigarh Museum and the Peabody Essex Museum. In 2006, her triptych work "Yatra" was acquired by the Asian Art Museum of San Francisco, California. Other works also been a part of group exhibitions including 'Kalpana: Figurative Art in India', presented by the Indian Council for Cultural Relations (ICCR) in London's Aicon Gallery in 2009. Her preferred medium is oil on masonite, though she has also worked in other media, including Murano glass, computer graphics and water colour. She is a well known muralist. She was awarded the Padma Shree in 2000. She lives and works in New Delhi.
Sangeet Natak Akademi is the national level academy for performing arts set up by the Government of India.
Paresh Maity is an Indian painter. He is a prolific painter in a short career span. In 2014, Government of India conferred upon him its fourth-highest civilian award the Padma Shri.
Central universities in India are public universities established by an Act of Parliament and are under the purview of the Department of Higher Education in the Ministry of Education, except for nine universities which are under the purview of other ministries. In general, universities in India are recognised by the University Grants Commission (UGC), which draws its power from the University Grants Commission Act, 1956. In addition, 15 Professional Councils are established, controlling different aspects of accreditation and coordination. Central universities, in addition, are covered by the Central Universities Act, 2009, which regulates their purpose, powers, governance etc., and established 12 new universities.
Pupul Jayakar was an Indian cultural activist and writer, best known for her work on the revival of traditional and village arts, handlooms, and handicrafts in post-independence India. According to The New York Times, she was known as "India's 'czarina of culture'", and founded arts festivals that promoted Indian arts in France, Japan, and the United States. She was a friend and biographer to both the Nehru-Gandhi family and J Krishnamurti. Jayakar had a close relationship with three prime ministers: Jawaharlal Nehru, his daughter Indira Gandhi and her son Rajiv Gandhi, and she was a close friend of Indira Gandhi. She served as cultural adviser to the latter two, confirming her preeminence in cultural matters.
Bikash Bhattacharjee was an Indian painter from Kolkata in West Bengal. Through his paintings, he depicted the life of the average middle-class Bengali – their aspirations, superstitions, hypocrisy and corruption, and even the violence that is endemic to Kolkata. He worked in oils, acrylics, water-colours, conté and collage. In 2003, he was awarded the highest award of Lalit Kala Akademi, India's National Academy of Arts, the Lalit Kala Akademi Fellowship.
The National Mission for Manuscripts (NAMAMI) is an autonomous organisation under Ministry of Culture, Government of India, established to survey, locate and conserve Indian manuscripts, with an aim to create national resource base for manuscripts, for enhancing their access, awareness and use for educational purposes. The Mission was initiated in February 2003, by the Ministry of Tourism and Culture, Government of India and Indira Gandhi National Centre for the Arts is the nodal agency for the execution of this project. It creates bibliographic databases of Indian manuscripts and is involved in the conservation and preservation of the manuscripts.
Haku Vajubhai Shah was an Indian painter, Gandhian, cultural anthropologist and author on folk and tribal art and culture. His art belonged to the Baroda Group and his works are considered in the line of artists who brought themes of folk or tribal art to Indian art.
The Cultural Zones of India are seven overlapping zones defined by the Ministry of Culture of the Government of India to promote and preserve the cultural heritage of various regions of India. Each of these zones has been provided with a zonal centre. Most zonal centres were announced by the then-Prime Minister of India, Rajiv Gandhi, in 1985 and formally began functioning in the 1986–87 period. Their stated goal is "to strengthen the ancient roots of Indian culture and evolve and enrich composite national culture".
The Allahabad Museum is a national-level museum in Prayagraj, Uttar Pradesh. Established in 1931, it is known for its rich collection and unique objects of art, and is funded by Ministry of Culture. Moreover, it is a premier research centre for archaeologists, historians and academicians and carries out extensive research activities and publications in archaeology, art and literature. Its rock art gallery has the largest collection of prehistoric paintings displayed in India dating from 14,000 B.C to 2000 B.C. The museum, using solar power system, has become the first museum in the country to become self-reliant in power generation. The Allahabad Museum is centrally located in the Civil Lines area of the city in a lush green garden at Chandrashekhar Azad Park, popularly known as Company Bagh. It is about 3 km away from the Allahabad railway junction and almost equidistant from three different Railway Stations such as Prayag, Rambagh and Prayagraj junction and about 12 km away from Prayagraj Airport.
Madhu Khanna is an Indian scholar based in Delhi who works on Indic studies, Religious Studies and Tantric studies. She is a well-known expert on the goddess centric Śakta tantric traditions of India. At present she serves as the Director and founding trustee of Tantra Foundation and Shrikunja. She is also currently serving as a subject expert to the Acarya Shankar Sanskritik Ekta Nyas, set up by the culture department of the Madhya Pradesh government for their Omkareshwar Project. At present she also serves in the academic council of Nalanda University and in the fellowship council of the Indian Institute of Advanced Studies, Shimla. She has many research papers as well as several books and exhibition catalogues to her credit. She has contributed to three national projects, as well as several research projects for the Indira Gandhi National Centre for the Arts (IGNCA).
Balan Nambiar is an Indian painter, sculptor, enamellist, photographer and an academic researcher.
Biman Bihari Das is an Indian sculptor and former Principal of the Government College of Art & Craft, Kolkata. He was honoured by the Government of India, in 2014, by bestowing on him the Padma Shri, the fourth highest civilian award, for his services to the field of Fine Arts.
Kalyan Kumar Chakravarty is an Indian historian, art historian, writer, action anthropologist, academician and administrator, known for his intercultural and cross-disciplinary research and activism. A retired officer of the Indian Administrative Service (IAS) of the 1970 batch, he was appointed Chairman of the Lalit Kala Akademi, India’s federal fine arts academy, in 2013.
The South-Central Zone Cultural, Nagpur or SCZCC one of the seven Zonal Cultural Centres in India was established in 1986 with its headquarters at Nagpur. It comprises the linguistically different states of Andhra Pradesh, Karnataka, Madhya Pradesh, Telangana, Chhattisgarh, Goa and Maharashtra. Each of these States has rich traditions of folk, tribal, fine arts and crafts. The Centre strives through its various activities to enrich, promote and strengthen these traditions. The centre is working under the control of Ministry of Culture, Government of India. The Governor of Maharashtra is the chairman of this centre.
Jagadish Chandra Dey, also known as Jagdish Dey, is an Indian painter and printmaker, known for his unique style of surrealism, where the real and unreal coexist. He has been a member of many art societies and juries.
