Prime Minister Narendra Modi, on Sunday, 31 May 2026, highlighted the discovery of three rare copper plates in Malhar, Chhattisgarh, unearthed under the Gyan Bharatam Abhiyan, describing them as windows into the governance, religion and culture of sixth- and seventh-century India.

Context

Sharing the find during his monthly radio programme Mann Ki Baat, the Prime Minister wrote in Hindi: 'ज्ञान भारतम् अभियान के तहत छत्तीसगढ़ के मल्हार में तीन दुर्लभ ताम्र पट्टिकाएं मिली हैं' — 'Under the Gyan Bharatam Abhiyan, three rare copper plates have been found in Malhar, Chhattisgarh.' He noted that the plates, believed to date to the sixth and seventh centuries CE, carry significant information about the administrative systems, religious practices and cultural life of that era.

Malhar is a well-documented archaeological site in Bilaspur district, Chhattisgarh, associated with the early medieval Dakshina Kosala region. The site has previously yielded inscriptions and artefacts linked to local dynasties that governed central India during that period.

Policy Backdrop

The Gyan Bharatam Abhiyan is a national campaign designed to discover, document and disseminate knowledge preserved in ancient Indian artefacts and texts. Copper-plate charters from the early medieval period are among the most important primary sources for historians, recording land grants, royal genealogies and endowments to religious institutions.

Since 2014, successive editions of Mann Ki Baat have periodically featured heritage discoveries — from Archaeological Survey of India excavations to state-level finds — as part of a broader effort to connect contemporary audiences with India's civilisational record. The Gyan Bharatam Abhiyan formalises that communication into a structured recovery and documentation drive.

Stakeholders and Impact

Historians and archaeologists working on early medieval Chhattisgarh stand to benefit most immediately, as epigraphic readings of the plates could shed fresh light on land-tenure systems, dynastic lineages and the spread of religious institutions in the Dakshina Kosala region. Local communities in Malhar may also see renewed interest in the site's heritage tourism potential.

The announcement amplifies the profile of state archaeology departments and central bodies involved in field surveys. Copper-plate inscriptions, once deciphered and translated, are typically published in epigraphic journals and can take months to years to fully analyse and authenticate.

What's Next

Attention will now turn to the publication of formal epigraphic readings and translations by the Archaeological Survey of India or the Chhattisgarh state archaeology department. The plates may be considered for inclusion in museum displays or digital archives under the Gyan Bharatam Abhiyan's documentation mandate.

If authenticated and dated to the sixth-seventh century CE, the inscriptions could add meaningfully to the corpus of early medieval records from central India — a region whose administrative history remains less thoroughly documented than that of the Gangetic plains or the Deccan.