Writer Shirshendu Mukhopadhyay pores over a manuscript at the Lotus Sutra exhibition. Picture by Anindya Shankar Ray

A collection of facsimiles of century-old Buddhist relics, rare palm-leaf scrolls and fresco paintings in Chinese caves has made its way to Calcutta after touring Japan, Sri Lanka, Singapore, Hong Kong, Bangkok and Laos, plus three Indian metros.

Titled Lotus Sutra, the exhibition is the biggest ever organised by Bharat Soka Gakkai, the Indian chapter of Soka Gakkai International, a Buddhist organisation that follows the teachings of 13th century Japanese monk Nichiren.

The display contains about 63 photographic panels and 12 manuscripts tracing the Silk Route, through which the contents of Buddha’s Lotus Sutra fanned out to the Indian subcontinent and Southeast Asia from Rajgir, Bihar.

“Buddha preached the Lotus Sutra in the last eight years of his life, and it upholds non-discrimination, gender equality and the possibility of all human beings attaining enlightenment. The exhibition aims to highlight this perspective and trace the origins of the Sutra,” said Naveena Reddi, the director-general of Bharat Soka Gakkai.

The six-day display held in association with ICCR at the Rabindranath Tagore Centre, was unveiled on Saturday. Find the facsimiles of the arresting fresco paintings from the Mogao Caves of China’s Gansu province, which describe the Sutra through parables. A copy of the Sutra inscribed on a Chinese fan, stone carvings of Buddha delivering the sermon and a large set of calligraphic records dating from 1st century BC in Sanskrit, Pali, Chinese, Tibetan, Korean, Sogdian and Khotan Saka, among other languages, form the bulk of the exhibits.

The Sanskrit manuscripts are from a cache of Buddhist relics found during the Otani expedition in China’s then Xinjiang province in early 20th century. These are now a part of the Lushun Museum Collection in China. The other documents have been sourced from the Cambridge University Library, Columbia University Press, the Royal Asiatic Society of Great Britain and Ireland, and the National Archives of Nepal. The facsimiles and panels have been made by the Institute of Oriental Philosophy in Japan.