National Mission on Cultural Mapping

April 10, 2023

Under the ‘Mera Gaon Meri Dharohar‘ (My Village My Heritage) programme of the National Mission for Cultural Mapping, the government has identified and documented distinctive features of more than one lakh villages across the country, in a bid to harness the unique cultural heritage of rural India.
In cultural asset mapping, villages have been broadly divided into seven-eight categories based on whether they are important ecologically, developmentally and scholastically, and if they are connected to some historical or mythological events.
- Ecological category includes Bishnoi village (for living in harmony with nature) near Jodhpur, Rajasthan, and Uttarakhand’s Raini village (Chipko movement).
- Developmental category includes Modhera in Gujarat (first solar-powered village in India).
- Historical category includes Kandel in Madhya Pradesh (famous Jal Satyagraha site), Suketi in Himachal Pradesh (Asia’s oldest fossil park), Pandrethan in Kashmir( the village of Shaivite mystic Lal Ded) and villages of Hanoli Uttarakhand and Vidurashwathar of Karnataka are linked to Mahabharata.

About NMCM

NMCM was launched by Ministry of Culture (MoC) in 2017 and handed over to Indira Gandhi National Centre for Arts (IGNCA) in 2021.
It aims to develop a comprehensive database of art forms, artists and other resources across the country.
Objective–
- Preserve rich cultural heritage of country for future generations.
- Create a strong “Cultural Vibrancy” throughout the nation.
- Convert vast and widespread cultural canvass of India into an objective Cultural Mapping.
MoC has partnered with Common Services Centres, under Ministry of Electronics & IT (MeitY) to conduct NMCM.