NATIONAL MISSION FOR NANUSCRIPTS

FROM ANOPHELES TO DESIGNER MOSQUITOES

A.Vasantha *

One hundred and fifty years ago, an Almora-born Briton, named Ronald Ross (1857-1932) designated August 20th as "Mosquito Day" to commemorate his victory over the mosquito mystery. The war waged by Ross against malaria still continues as it is as elusive as ever in spite of the persistent efforts to combat it. Malaria still remains one of the devastating public health menaces in the world killing more than one million people every year. It causes about 30-500 million infections worldwide and the children are the major victims. It is now regarded as deadly disease as tuberculosis.

The malarial infection is on the rise with increasing human activity on the earth. Large areas of the world are becoming swampy, extending the breeding ground for malarial mosquitoes. Malaria has now spread to Russia and southern United States and is estimated to inflict 81 million people within a decade. Once thought to be the disease of the tropics, it is fast becoming global. The developed countries not so enthusiastic about malarial research, are now waking up to the developing countries’ plea for more funds for malarial research. At present meagre funds are available for malarial research around the world amounting to not more than 85 million U.S. dollars. The scene becomes more gloomy when one realizes that the victims of malaria are mostly the poor and the progress of medical research in this direction is slower.

Causes

The cause of malaria was baffling the British doctors who were manning the health services of India in the pre-Independence days. There were many theories about its causation. It was often attributed to inhalation of foul marshy air emanating from damp marshy places. Hence the name malaria. Some thought it was caused by drinking infected water. While these speculations were being debated, the disease was taking a heavy toll every year in India. Doctors like Ross and others had to fight the disease bravely under extremely trying conditions as nothing was known about its cause or cure. It was seen that quinine could mitigate the disease to some extent and it was used extensively.

Ross’ association with another doctor in England, Patrick Manson (1844-1922) led to his experimental examination of Manson’s malaria-mosquito theory that was gaining currency. While it was vaguely known that mosquitoes cause malaria the question before the medical world was how do malarial parasites enter into humans or animals.

But this was only part of the answer to the malarial problem. Ross was yet to discover the type of mosquito which caused the scourge. When Ross began his work nothing was known about the type of mosquitoes. He could get no help from the entomologists working in the Indian Museum, Kolkata and it was only by degrees they realized that he was dealing with three different types of mosquitoes - the grey or barred (Culex), the brindled type (Aedes) and the Dappled Winged (Anopheles). We know today that the first is just a nuisance mosquito whereas the second one causes the deadly dengue and the third one is responsible for malaria. In the rest house at Sigur Ghat (Secunderabad) Ross discovered for the first time an anopheles adult and realized its resting attitude on the wall differed from the other two types he had been studying previously. He found that malaria was caused by the female Anopheles.

Ross received the Nobel Prize for his brilliant work, a great discovery, in 1902 and this was the only medical research carried out in India that received the highest award of the scientific world. He celebrated 20th August each year as ‘mosquito day’ the last one being on August 1931, a year before his death in 1932.

In 1928 a tablet was placed on the cottage at Secunderabad in which he had toiled alone for years. It has an inscription that reads. "To the memory of Sir Ronald Ross and the discovery he made here on August 20, 1897 that the anopheles mosquito is the carrier of malaria parasite".

Having discovered the cause of mosquito malaria the next step was to control it. While the pharmaceutical industry was developing various anti-malarial drugs, a sharp reduction in the malaria-carrying mosquitoes was brought about by DDT and other insecticides. Soon their anti-environmental effects came to be known and at the same time the malaria parasites also developed drug resistance. Hence new control strategies were needed. Once again the malarial scientist had to turn to the laboratory.

Research

The parasites that cause the disease multiply inside red blood cells, bursting from them to invade the new cells. But how the parasite breaks out of the cells was a mystery. Researchers have found that this happens in two steps: first they exist enclosed in a closed sac they have made. Then the sac quickly bursts releasing the parasites. Enzymes that break down the protein proteases were thought to help the parasites emerge from red blood cells. Scientists at the Howard Hughes Medical Institute in the U.S.A., have recently studied the effect of a protease inhibitor called E-64 on the malaria and found that it did not stop the parasite from escaping out of the blood cells but prevented them from rupturing the sac that enclosed them.

An important step in the life of the parasite is its injection into the salivary glands of the female anopheles. A group of scientists at the John Hopkins School of Public Health, U.S.A., has identified a protein in the salivary glands of the female Anopheles gambiae mosquito- the primary malaria carrier in Africa- that appears to help plasmodium (parasite that causes malaria) recognize and gain entrance to the mosquito’s salivary glands. They have discovered that the number of parasites in mosquito salivary glands can be greatly reduced if this protein is neutralized with an antibody they have raised.

The advances made in gene research have led scientists to genetically transform mosquito species that cause malaria raising hopes of a future strategy to control malaria.

An interesting development is the cracking of the genetic secrets of the malarial parasite. After 5 years of intensive work the scientists of Britain’s Wellcome Trust, the Institute for Genome Research and the Stanford University (both in the US) are close to publishing the entire DNA sequence of the parasite. Scrutinising the parasite’s 30 million letters of DNA code and its 6000 genes is expected to have a major impact on the discovery of a new drug.

Scientists at the BioInformatics Division of Indian Institute of Chemical Technology, Hyderabad have brought mosquitoes into the net. It is a sophisticated net -a range of Internet-enabled software tools to check the spread of mosquito causing malaria. It is meant for public health officials and workers to enable them to identify speedily and precisely the different types of mosquitoes in their areas. The idea is to recognize the types on the spot without having to refer them to the laboratory for identification. The 54 different species of Anopheles have been described on the basis of their visible physical characteristics. Software to calculate the flight range and path of different species has also been developed.

* Science Writer

** August 20th is observed as Mosquito Day.

NATIONAL MISSION FOR NANUSCRIPTS

N. Gopalaswami *

During its history extending over 5000 years, India has witnessed a stupendous output of literature. This literary material has been handed down the generations both orally as well as in written forms. In written form, the vast mass of literature has been preserved in different languages and scripts on different kinds of material like birch bark, palm leaf, cloth, wood, stone and paper. The material is based on diverse subjects such as mathematics, material science, ayurveda, sculpture, architecture, astronomy and astrology.

Excavations in Central Asia have unearthed manuscripts of Indian origin on subjects like literature, mathematics and medicine. It is said that, Hieun Tsang returned to China with a large collection of Indian manuscripts on subjects like logic, metaphysics, medicine, romance, fables and mysticism. Buddhist monasteries and universities like Nalanda, Taxila and Vikramshila were well known repositories of manuscripts.

Personal collections of British officers, who took a keen interest in Indian culture and collected privately, were purchased by East India Company and Imperial Library, Berlin in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. Buhler and Aufrecht, the well-known scholars of manuscripts, gave their collections to the India Office Library, London. Surveys were made by rulers in pre-independent India to assess the collections and contents of manuscripts in the country. The knowledge about the existence of manuscripts grew considerably due to surveys undertaken by the Government of India during 1868-1878.

The German scholar Theodor Aufrecht’s work in the last decade of the nineteenth century to prepare an alphabetical register of names and works contained in Sanskrit manuscripts is considered pioneering as it was the first attempt to bring together manuscript catalogues of various institutions in the world. The Catalogus Catalogorum printed in three parts in 1891, 1896 and 1903 was compiled from references to manuscripts noticed in the catalogues and lists of manuscripts available during that time. Manuscripts exist not only in Sanskrit but also in languages such as Pali and Prakrit, Persian and Arabic. Discoveries are still to be made of manuscripts of pre-Kalidasa dramatists, pre-Sankara vedantic works, early Sankhya works, works on grammar prior to Bhartrihari and commentaries on Natya Shashtra, Baudhayana and Upavarsa which are referred to in later manuscripts. The discovery of lost works extends the boundaries of the knowledge and awareness about Indian heritage. A large number of Indian and foreign scholars are engaged in exploring these areas of knowledge to add a fresh dimension to the studies of the country’s culture and heritage.

Comprehensive information regarding the status of manuscript wealth of India is not available at present for a number of reasons. Only a small percentage of these manuscripts has been surveyed and catalogued. In fact, even existing catalogues are not uniform. In one of the recent surveys made by Dr. S.C. Biswas and Mr. M.K. Prajapati on behalf of Indian National Trust for Art and Cultural Heritage (INTACH) during 1988-90 and on the basis of scrutiny of about 1,100 printed catalogues and hand lists belonging to 70 libraries, institutions and individuals, it was estimated that there are around 3,500,000 manuscripts in India and over 210,000 of Indian origin in other countries. Out of these, the catalogues exist for not more than 1,000,000. The INTACH is a leading organization engaged in surveys and preservation of manuscript wealth in the country. It has established a number of small conservation laboratories in the country besides conducting training and awareness programmes for preservation of manuscripts. Considering the magnitude of the task, these efforts,however, need to be supplemented.

The National Archives of India (NAI) under the Department of Culture has taken some initiatives for preservation and cataloguing of manuscripts. Under the project, National Register of Private Records, NAI undertakes surveys and listing of private papers, manuscripts and historical documents in the possession of individuals, and private institutions in collaboration with the State Archives departments. On a regular basis, the National Archives has published 19 volumes of the National Register of Private Records. This database, however, is neither a comprehensive reference guide about manuscripts nor does it provide the necessary level of detail about the nature of manuscripts or their preservation status.

NAI implements two schemes providing financial assistance to archives, libraries and museums whether under the State or run by NGOs for cataloguing of preservation and publication of manuscripts and rare books. The NAI has disbursed nearly Rs.8 crore on these activities in the last 15 years.

The Indira Gandhi National Centre for Arts (IGNCA) has undertaken microfilming of manuscripts since 1989. Till date microfilming in 66 libraries of the country has covered around 200,000 manuscripts, running into 11 million folios . The microfilms cover a diverse range of subjects such as religion, medicine, literature, philosophy, astrology, astronomy, mathematics, jurisprudence, geography, sculpture and performing arts. The underlying objective of the IGNCA has been to build up a national manuscript collection so as to make them available for research purposes under one roof.

Institutions of the Department of Culture such as Khuda Baksh Oriental Public Library, Rampur Raza Library, Salarjung Museum, National Museum, Indian Museum, Asiatic Society, Kolkatta, Central Institute of Buddhist Studies and National Library, Kolkata are well known institutions which have over 80,000 rare manuscripts in their collections. Many of these institutions maintain descriptive catalogues not only of manuscripts in their possession but also of other organizations.

Manuscript holdings with State government-run institutions are widely distributed. Information, however, is not readily available regarding the extent to which these manuscripts are catalogued, scientifically preserved and made accessible to scholars. A number of universities are known to have substantial collections of manuscripts. But the universities receive limited funding and are unable to do justice to the work.

Hundreds of societies, trusts and voluntary bodies throughout the country, often with no permanent staff or premises, have a substantial number of manuscripts in their possession. While many of them, particularly those holding the Jain manuscripts, are relatively well organized, many more are unaware of the basic need for record management and professional care.

There are a number of religious organizations such as churches, mutts, and temples that have traditionally been in possession of manuscripts. But the extent to which these manuscripts have been catalogued or made ready for wider public use is only a matter of conjecture. Finally there is the category of privately-owned records and manuscripts about which nothing much is known except through word of mouth.

The major actions that need to be undertaken in respect of this manuscript wealth are - complete cataloguing both of public collections and private holdings, preparation of subject index and descriptive index, assistance for conservation and preservation of manuscripts, augmenting and assisting storage facilities and preparing micro films and digitization. Training should be imparted to the persons and for reading the various scripts in which the manuscripts are recorded, mainly Sanskrit, Grantha, Prakrit, Arabic, Persian, Tigalari, Modi, Nandinagari and Tibetan. Besides, scholarships should be encouraged to the persons proficient in reading these scripts.

A holistic framework, policy or strategy for survey, listing, cataloguing and dissemination of information is the need of the hour. Therefore, the National Mission for Manuscripts is proposed to be launched by the Department of Culture during the current year with the goal of enhancing access and improving the awareness about this unique cultural heritage. It will also take care of the preservation and publication of the store houses of knowledge that can help education and research across a wide spectrum of subjects and concerns. A part of the manuscript wealth of this country also resides in libraries and universities abroad especially in the USA, UK, France, Germany and Russia. Hence, a proposal has been made to secure micro film copies or digital copies of such manuscript wealth. With a budget of Rs.25 crore during the Tenth Plan period, it will also set up a National Library of Manuscripts.

* Secretary, Department of Culture, Government of India.