Kolkata: A museum dedicated to Rabindranath Tagore's trips to Italy was inaugurated at Jorasanko's Takurbari. Consul General of Italy in Kolkata and Rabindra Bharati University (RBU) Vice-Chancellor Subhrokomal Mukhopadhyay inaugurated the museum in the city.
The museum has been set up in view of the completion of 75 years of relationship between India and Italy. The history of Tagore's Europe Bhavan and information about his visits to Italy have been highlighted here.
Italian consul general Gianluca Rubagatti said, "The Prime Minister of Italy came to India and held a meeting with Prime Minister Narendra Modi on various issues and spoke about taking five steps to strengthen Italy-India relations. One of these is the museum at Jorasanko Thakurbari on Tagore's trips to Italy. We have set up a similar museum in Rome. This museum has been created with initiative of the Italian Ministry of Foreign Affairs."
Rabindranath Tagore visited Italy thrice in his lifetime. His first visit was in 1878 at the age of 17. The second trip was in 1925 and the third one in 1926. The last two trips were on official invitation. The history and photographs of those trips have all been displayed at the museum.
RBU Vice-Chancellor Mukhopadhyay said, "This museum has been inaugurated with the initiative of the Italian government and RBU. All these information and pictures have been collected based on the documents found on Tagore's three trips to Italy. If anything new is found in the future, it will be added to the existing gallery."
During his trip to Italy in 1926, Tagore met Mussolini, who had invited him there. Although information about the controversial meeting with Mussolini has been put up at the museum, there are no photographs of the meeting.
The museum has been set up on the third floor of Ramprasad Bhavan in Jorasanko Thakurbari. Tagore travelled to eight cities in Italy and spent 41 days there while addressing lectures four times. Also, he participated in various cultural events and meetings in Italy on official invitation. In this exhibition hall, there are photographs of those visits, news published in newspapers and messages written by poet. There are also many stories of Tagore's experience in Italy including the one when he stayed at the grand hotel in Rome for the first time along with poems penned down during that period.
Read on:
