United Nations, External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar inaugurated an exhibition highlighting Indian civilisation's contributions to mathematics, noting that the global narrative of scientific progress has long been viewed through a "narrow lens" and stressing the need to "right" historical distortions.
The exhibition titled 'From Shunya to Ananta - The Indian Civilization's Contribution to Mathematics', hosted by the Permanent Mission of India to the UN, has been organised by the Indian Council for Cultural Relations in collaboration with the India International Centre.
Jaishankar said, "When we assemble at the United Nations, we often speak of a shared human heritage. Yet if we look at the arc of modern history, the global narrative of scientific progress has for far too long been viewed through a narrow lens, limited in time and in geography," he said in his remarks as he inaugurated the "historic, first-of-its-kind" mathematics exhibition at the United Nations headquarters Monday.
India's Ambassador to the US Vinay Mohan Kwatra, Consul General of India in New York Binaya Pradhan, Professor in Mathematics at Princeton University and Fields Medal awardee Manjul Bhargava, as well as UN Ambassadors, diplomats and senior officials, attended the inauguration.
Jaishankar had undertaken an official visit to Jamaica, Suriname and Trinidad and Tobago from May 2-10.
During his brief visit to New York on Monday, he inaugurated the exhibition, which forms part of 'SAMHiTA' , a project of the India International Centre, supported by the Ministry of External Affairs.
The special interactive exhibition highlights ancient mathematical concepts with roots in India that then spread across the world over millennia - from zero, the decimal place value system, algebra and algorithms to planetary models, astronomical computation, combinatorics, and binary enumeration and geometry - the 'Baudhayana-Pythagorean theorem.
The exhibition also recognises the lineage of legendary Indian scholars from Aryabhata, Brahmagupta and Bhaskara to the Kerala School of astronomy and mathematics.
Jaishankar said, "We who are gathered here are not merely looking at numbers on a wall. We are observing a civilisation that originated in the intellectual soil of India. This is an inheritance that is as much about the future as it is about the past," he said.
He underlined the need to appreciate that "democratisation of technology, indeed, democratisation of the world requires a democratisation of history. It is only by righting the distortions of the past that we can accurately address issues of the future," he said.
The exhibition will take viewers on a "journey across millennia to witness how mathematical discoveries from the Indian civilisation travelled across the world and continue to shape our modern lives.
Jaishankar said while the global diffusion of mathematics is a tale of interconnectedness, every supply chain of ideas has a starting point.
"As you walk through this exhibition, you will note that the very code, which is the basis of our current technological age, was conceptualised in India centuries ago," he said.
On how the exhibit matters in the United Nations, he said, "A diverse and democratic collective cannot be built on a unidimensional narrative. These truths will increasingly become apparent as we embark on the journey of AI, where our grasp of the past will profit from the tools of the future."
He hoped that the exhibition will heighten awareness and spark a debate about the richness of "our inherently pluralistic world. It will also help cast aside prejudices and assumptions about the embrace of technology in the current era.
"This exhibition is a reminder that mathematics is a universal language, and its spread has served and continues to serve a global good. The United Nations, as the most established platform for international cooperation, can draw on that message in its quest to advocate closer international collaboration," he said.
