PASIGHAT, 9 Jul: Arunachal Pradesh University’s (APU) Mass Communication Department Assistant Professor Dr Prem Taba has been awarded the prestigious South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation (SAARC) Research Grant (SRG) 2026-27 by the SAARC Cultural Centre (SCC), Colombo, for a research project under the theme ‘Interpreting Shared Heritage: Cross-Cultural Narratives in Museums in the SAARC Region’.
The selection was communicated through an official letter of offer dated 8 July, signed by Dr Kaushalya Kumarasinghe, director of the SAARC Cultural Centre, describing the review process as “highly competitive” and noting that Dr Taba’s proposal demonstrated “considerable scholarly merit and relevance to the theme of the SRG.”
Dr Taba’s winning proposal, titled ‘When the Vitrine Silences the Forest: Decolonising Tribal Heritage Communication in the Museums of the Eastern Himalayan SAARC Corridor’, examines how the Jawaharlal Nehru State Museum in Itanagar and the National Museum of Bhutan in Paro represent – or fail to represent – the region’s tribal communities.
Each awardee under the programme receives US $3,000, disbursed in two instalments – US $1,500 at the commencement of the project and the remaining US $1,500 upon submission and acceptance of the final research report.
Speaking on the recognition, Dr Taba said it is a moment of pride not just for him but for the wider academic and cultural community of the region. “This grant is a recognition that the heritage of our tribal communities belongs not only to Arunachal Pradesh but to the shared cultural memory of South Asia. For me, this is deeply personal: it is an opportunity to bring the voices of our own people into a global conversation on how museums represent, or fail to represent, indigenous knowledge. I see this as a moment for Arunachal Pradesh University and for our state to be seen and heard on a platform like SAARC, and I hope this work opens the door for more scholars from our region to engage with international academic and cultural institutions.”
The SAARC Research Grants 2026, approved by the 15th meeting of the governing board of the SCC held in Colombo in August 2025 and endorsed at the 62nd session of the SAARC Programming Committee meeting in Kathmandu in February 2026, invited academics and researchers from across SAARC member states – Afghanistan, Bangladesh, Bhutan, India, Maldives, Nepal, Pakistan and Sri Lanka – to submit original proposals examining how museums in the region interpret and communicate cross-cultural heritage narratives, underlining the competitive nature of the award.
Under the terms of the grant, Dr Taba will be expected to produce a final publishable research report incorporating recommendations from the SCC’s Research Grants Committee or Research Review Committee, with the completed report subject to review, editing, and possible publication under the Centre’s publications programme.
