Story of Manipuri python at National Museum

"Poubi Lai - The Story of a Giant Python", a single object exhibition based on a Manipuri folklore was inaugurated at the National Museum here on Tuesday.

Mounted by Bhopal's Indira Gandhi Manav Sangrahalaya (IGRMS) in collaboration with the National Museum, the exhibition will find depiction in the national capital for the next 42 days, as the pioneering sculpture of Manipur's Poubi Lai, a mythical reptile.

In the recent past, the government has been making efforts to promote culture from the northeast, K.K. Mittal, additional secretary in the culture ministry, said at the inaugural event.

"The National Museum, which is seen as a space for classical art, will now be showing the story of an ethnic community from the northeast," Mittal added.

Conceived and chiselled by late wood carver Karam Dineshwar Singh, one of the successors of the royal family-associated Karigar craftspeople, the 21-foot-long artwork found expression in 2002 from a dream he had of Poubi Lai.

Completed in six months, the sculpture had its inaugural exhibition the same year at the Manipur State Museum in state capital Imphal.