The High Commissioner of Sri Lanka Milinda Moragoda on Monday gifted a Sinhala translation of the Holy Quran to the Jama Masjid here. The holy book will be kept on permanent display in Jama Masjid for the visitors.
The initiative is a display of Sri Lanka’s multi-cultural heritage weeks after it sent the holy Piprahwa relics of the Buddha to India after 141 years on board the first flight that connected Sri Lanka with Uttar Pradesh’s Kushinagar, the place where the Buddha had attained Mahaparinirvana.
The initiative to highlight Sri Lanka’s cultural relations with India is part of an official Integrated Country Strategy for its missions for 2021-’23. Sri Lanka aims to promote the sites associated with the Ramayana. ‘Trails’ related to Shiva-Shakti traditions and the Velankanni church are expected to be part of this cultural initiative.
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Colombo’s people-to-people focus is also aimed at celebrating the centenary of the visit of Rabindranath Tagore in 1922. Coinciding with it, it is planning to set up a Consulate General in Kolkata that will become functional next year.
Tagore, who wrote the national anthems of India and Bangladesh, is said to have influenced the Sri Lankan anthem too.