17th century Mewar Ramayana United and Gets Digital Makeover

The 17th century Mewar Ramayana manuscript consists of 400 exquisite paintings. But the pages of this wonderful tribute to the epic Valmiki Ramayan was in two countries – majority of the pages in Britain and the rest of the pages in India. Now the two countries have joined to create a digitized version of the book.

Times of India reports 

The Mewar manuscript was commissioned by Rana Jagat Singh I of Mewar in 1649 - who regarded himself as a direct descendent of Lord Ram and contains over 400 exquisite paintings.
It is widely considered to be one of the finest of all surviving illustrated copies. The British Library currently holds around 80% of the surviving manuscript and the remaining folios are held by the CSMVS Museum as well as the Baroda Museum and Rajasthan Oriental Institute.
The digitized version will go live on March 21. 

The project was announced by British Prime Minister David Cameron during his trip to Mumbai last year. 

The project is funded by one of the oldest philanthropic institutions in India, The Sir Dorabji Tata Trust along with Friends of the British Library and the World Collection programme. 

Library's Chief Executive Roly Keating said "one of the most magnificent surviving copies of the Ramayana will be reunified online in a major international project. We hope that the digitisation of this unique text on this digital platform will allow people to study and enjoy this great treasure as never before."