Abid Ali Khan Centre for Digital archive and Translation of Cultures was established in February, 2023. It plans to undertake projects to digitize and archive documents relating to the socio-cultural, historical and political life of Malda district. The objective is to build a Centre of excellence for research and archiving materials that would preserve the history of Malda, which was part of Gour, the capital of medieval Bengal. Malda district is known for its rich cultural heritage, architectural splendour, popular folk practices, and ancient religious sites. However, there is hardly any research centre / archive that houses all the documents related to these spheres. This proposed Centre shall meet that requirement and cater to the demands of researchers in years to come. 

Objective of the Centre

1.      The Centre would digitize Gazette reports, old newspaper cuttings on major historical events of the Malda district, local newspapers, rare books and documents collected from writers and scholars of Malda, private papers etc.

2.      The Centre would archive the Gambhira songs/ interviews of scholars on Gambhira, rare books written on Gambhira.

3.      It would archive books written by the colonial administrators/ European visitors/ Missionaries in Malda.

4.  It would archive life stories of important political personalities from Malda, such as Gani Khan Chowdhury, Shanti Sen and others.

5.      It would focus on the unpublished works of Benoy Sarkar.

6.      It would collect and preserve the documents relating to the Sufi shrines/ Buddhist/ Sikh heritage of Malda.

7.      Last but not the least, it would archive the little magazines published from Malda.