Digitisation of Mathilakom documents to resume

THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: Mathilakom Documents, which contain many a missing links to complete the history of Sree Padmanabhaswamy temple, will finally see light after an interval. The digitisation of Mathilakom Documents, the ambitious project of the State Archives Department and which came to a halt after the funds ran out in March last, will resume on November 1.Ever since Sree Padmanabhaswamy temple attained a new status with the hidden treasures in its vaults coming under global scanner, historians and archivists have been pressing for the need to transliterate and translate the Mathilakom documents.The government has now given the go-ahead for the digitisation programme, which includes transliteration and translation by sanctioning funds and allowing the Department to appoint three transliterators. “Unlike last time, the documents have acquired more significance now. The digitisation programme will be continued and completed this time, hopefully without much delay. It would be made available online once it is done, said J Rejikumar, State Archives Department director. It was three years back that the Archives Department initiated the digitisation programme.The Mathilakom Documents are a bunch of ‘churunas, scrolls of palm-leaf documents in bundles of loose leaves written in ancient language which is a mix of the scripts - vattezhuthu, kolezhuthu, Malayanma and Malayalam.The Department had hired young hands, just out of Kariavattom college, Department of Linguistics, gave in-house training and put them on the tedious job. The ‘churunas’ were cleaned first, scanned and entered online using ‘likitham’ software designed by the C-DIT for the purpose. The seven-member transliterators team then decoded  and translating it.Historians believe that the there was every possibility that an inventory might have been prepared during those times when the wealth was stored in the vaults and it might be referred to in the documents.However, the concern remains that many of the Mathilakom Documents, which are still in the possession of the temple and not transferred to the Department, might be getting moth-eaten.