India's ancient maritime history of voyages to Southeast Asia will be recreated with age-old stitched ship technology by Kartika Purnima of 2025, said Sanjeev Sanyal, member of the Economic Advisory Council to the Prime Minister.
Statement:
“The ship will be about 20-metre long, will have no GPS and would be similar to the ships made in ancient days when India had close connections with Southeast Asia via maritime trade,” he said.
“There will be another attempt to sail from the coast of Gujarat to Oman soon,” added Sanyal.
He was speaking about his recently released book Revolutionaries, where he made a case for India's armed resistance in obtaining freedom from British Rule.
"I have tried to do through my books and research to bring back this maritime history back into conversation, back into consciousness and we are hoping one way we can do it is by reconstructing a stitch ship from 2000 years ago and hopefully sail all the way from Odisha to Bali," he said.
"Some of you may know there is an existing popular festival called ‘Balijatra’ which happens on Kartik Purnima. This commemorates what better way to relive and commemorate it than to build a real instant design ship and to sail on those ancient routes," Sanyal said earlier.
Information:
Eminent flute maestro Hariprasad Chaurasia, Chipko movement leader Sekhar Pathak, mythologist Ashwin Sanghi, noted Odissi dancers and media personalities participated in more than 70 sessions held during the three days starting February 24.
