Professor Vijay Chandru (Founder-Trustee, IIACD, INAE Distinguished Technologist, IISc & Founder-Director, Vizara Technologies Pvt. Ltd.) was one of the key members of the multi-institutional Program Committee that conceptualized and organized the first International Heritage Symposium and Exhibition (IHSE) on 15-16 January, 2020 with the theme “Digitising our Heritage for the Future: An interdisciplinary dialogue.”

IIACD’s unique and innovative Augmented Reality (AR) Postcards of Lepakshi Vijayanagara Murals and the Kiratarjuniya exhibited at the IHSE Indian Heritage in Digital Space exhibition in the Special gallery, National Museum, New Delhi (Jan 15 - Feb 23, 2020) in collaboration with our technology partner FlippAR were widely appreciated.

Ambassador V. Latha Reddy (Trustee, IIACD) and Professor Vijaya Chandru were invited to share their perspectives as panelists in the two day IHSE symposium where Professor Uma Chandru (Director, IIACD) also made an invited technical presentation.

As co-editor and co-authors of several chapters in the Springer volume Digital Hampi: Preserving the Indian Cultural Heritage, Professors Vijay Chandru and Uma V Chandru were invited to join in the book release by the Hon. Minister of State for Tourism, Shri Prahlad Singh Patel in the inaugural session of the IHSE Symposium (Jan 15, 2020).

Professor Uma V Chandru made a technical presentation at IHSE on Jan 15, 2020, which focused on IIACD’s innovative Lepakshi Vijayanagara Murals and Kiratarjuniya Augmented Reality Postcards project of our CHATS team in collaboration with FlippAR. The presentation was jointly with Deeksha Moily (Software Engineer, IIACD) & Vivek Mahaveer Jain (CEO, FlippAR).

Ambassador V. Latha Reddy (IIACD Trustee and Chairperson of the Deccan Heritage Foundation, India) elaborated on The Practice of Heritage Conservation and Reconstruction in the panel discussion on The Re-construction and Re-creation of Damaged Sites and Artefacts (Jan 15, 2020) .

Professor Vijay Chandru spoke on the evolution of Digital Heritage Science and the social and ethical dimensions of advances in technology in the context of heritage.

A highlight of the IIACD presentations was the captivating Augmented Reality animation of a scene from the Kiratrajuniya depicting Arjuna being blessed by Indra and going deeper into the forest on the Indrakiladri mountain to perform penance to propitiate Lord Shiva’s blessings and obtain the supernatural weapon Pasupatastra that can help the Pandavas defeat the Kauravas and regain their kingdom lost in a rigged game of dice.