India and Israel New Cultural Agreement: Key Points

India and Israel signed a new cultural agreement to strengthen people-to-people exchanges. This agreement was signed by India’s Ambassador to Israel, Sanjeev Singla and Israel’s Foreign Minister Gabi Ashkenazi.

Key Points of the Agreement

• The new cultural agreement will be a three year programme on cultural cooperation from 2020-23.
• The areas of cooperation under the agreement are exchange of culture and art experts; organizing literature fests and book fairs as well as promoting the translation of famous works in each other’s languages; enhancing cooperation in the protection of cultural heritage and archaeology with the help of Israel Antiquities Authority (IIA) and Archaeological Survey of India (ASI).
• The agreement also includes encourage direct contacts between national libraries and book publishers; student exchanges through scholarships.
• Co-operation in co-production in the field of cinema and audio-visual is also highlighted in the agreement. This co-operation on co-production was agreed by the Prime Minister of Israel, Benjamin Netanyahu, during his visit to India in 2018.
• Also, major emphasis will be laid to bring the youth of both the countries together through participation in festivals, sharing experiences, knowledge, etc.

Israel also signed a cooperation agreement with the Uttar Pradesh government on August 20 for resolving water crisis in Bundelkhand region.