Art, Culture and Youth department

Room No. 330

New Secretariat, Vikas Bhawan, Patna-800015.

E-mail: culturebihar@gmail.com

Phone: (0612)-2211619.

Fax: (0612)-2230173.

Bihar has a glorious past and rich cultural heritage. It consists of five cultural zones, viz. Mithila, Magadh, Bhojpur, Aang and Bajjika, on regional language basis. To preserve and develop the art and culture of Bihar in different zones, Directorate of Cultural Affairs was constituted in 1986.

Lord Buddha, Lord Mahavira, and Guru Govind singh came from the pious soil of Bihar, who pioneered universal fraternity and unity. It has been a land of Aryabhatta, Chanakya, Chitragupta, Vidyapati and many others. Everybody knows places like Rajgriha, Nalanda, Bodh Gaya, Vikramshila, Patliputra, Vaishali, etc. with their past glory and present profess.
 

The objectives of Directorate of Cultural Affairs can briefly be summarized as shown below:

• To encourage and promote study and research in the fields of Music, Dance, Drama, Painting and other fine arts and applied arts.
• To give recognition and to co-ordinate and evaluate the functions of voluntary organization engaged in cultural activities like Music, Dance, Drama, painting and other fine arts to provide assistance for their growth and development.
• To encourage the exchange of ideas between various schools of art and enrichment of techniques by organizing conferences, lectures, festival and exhibitions.
• To encourage artists and organizations to achieve artistic excellence by organizing competitions and awarding prizes and distinctions.
• To co-operate with similar bodies as there may be and other institutions and associations for the furtherance of the objectives and for enrichment of Indian Culture as well as State Culture as a whole.
• To encourage the Theatre Centers for performing arts for children and rural folk in different places and to ensure co-operation among such centers already in existence.
• To encourage development of amateur dramatic activity to sponsor Music, dance and drama festivals and to hold exhibitions of painting Photography and sculpture.
• To accord recognition to the artists for outstanding achievement in performing the visual art forms.
• To encourage the setting up of institutions to provide training and research in various fields of Art.
• To publish and to promote publication of literature on art.
• To award scholarship and prizes to deserving artists.
• To encourage and foster the revival and development of vanishing art form.
• To promote the study of traditional art and craft techniques and to encourage surviving indigenous craftsman, painters and sculptures.
• To develop and promote the rich diversity and uniqueness of various art form of the state and to upgrade and enrich consciousness of the people about their cultural heritage.
• To frame such programmes as would encourage and involve the youth of the State through the process of seminars, exchanges, workshops and such other cultural activity relating to preservation development and dissemination of cultural heritage of Bihar and India also.
• To pursue such other activities and programme as would strengthen and promote the cultural inter linkage amongst different cultural zones of the state such as Mithila, Magadh, Bhojpur,Bajjika and Angika.

To achieve the above aims and objects, we have two academies such as Bihar Sangeet Natak Academy and Bihar Lalit kala Academy.

Different schemes of the directorate are as follows:

• Grant Scheme
• Artist Aid Fund
• Awards