Dear Matthew,

The thought that someone may not be making a difference between (a) Tibetan language and Tibetan script and (b) Hindi and Nagari script occurred to me too. 

Given my experience of how summaries of my lectures appeared in Indian newspapers, I considered it more probable that a newspaper reporter would be behind the confusion of transcription with translation, if it has indeed occurred. If the director of the BRS was the cause of the confusion, we are in a much worse situation than I thought. In any case, it would be safer to check if a Tibetan-looking manuscript, photograph or slide actually contains a Sanskrit work photographed by Rahul Sankrityayan.

Thanks for the reference to Jackson’s survey. I did not know it existed.
Best wishes.

ashok


On May 6, 2017, at 2:14 AM, Matthew Kapstein <mkapstei@uchicago.edu> wrote:

Dear Ashok et al.,

This seems to be referring primarily to Tibetan manuscript holdings; it is not at all
clear the Rahula's photographs of Skt. mss. are involved. And the idea of translating
a whole collection of Tibetan mss. into Hindi, without assessing the collection
in relation to on-going Tibetological work, merely reflects the regrettable ignorance on
the part of the concerned administration regarding what it is that they actually hold. 

The Tibetan collection has been surveyed here:

David P. Jackson: The ‘Miscellaneous series ’ of Tibetan texts in the Bihar Research Society, Patna: A handlist. (Tibetan and Indo Tibetan Studies, 2.) [xiv], 271 pp. Stuttgart: Franz Steiner Verlag, 1989. DM48

best,
Matthew

Matthew Kapstein
Directeur d'études,
Ecole Pratique des Hautes Etudes

Numata Visiting Professor of Buddhist Studies,
The University of Chicago