AI-enabled digital story telling of tribal freedom fighters at Chhattisgarh museum

RAIPUR: Long before textbooks recognised them, Adivasi men and women in central and eastern India rose in collective defiance — laying down lives, homes and harvests to resist colonial rule.

Their stories are now being told as the Centre has approved 11 museums dedicated to tribal freedom fighters, and the flagship Shaheed Veer Narayan Singh Memorial-cum-Tribal Freedom Fighters Museum in Nava Raipur was inaugurated by Prime Minister Narendra Modi on November 1.The museum pairs hundreds of traditional sculptures with AI-enabled digital storytelling — an attempt not only to memorialise sacrifice but to make fragile oral histories searchable, translatable and accessible to new generations.

“The museum is designed as a learning centre and a living tribute to Adivasi men and women whose sacrifices remain little known beyond their homelands,” said Sonmoni Borah, Principal Secretary, Chhattisgarh Tribal Welfare Department.Stone, stories and softwareBuilt on roughly 10 acres at a reported outlay of about ₹50 crore, the Nava Raipur complex houses some 650 sculptures across more than a dozen themed galleries.

Visitors move through episodic displays that trace a century and more of tribal resistance — from local Halba and Surguja uprisings to the Parlakot, Meria and Tarapur revolts and the Muriya and Lingagiri movements. Curators have also foregrounded episodes usually absent from mainstream narratives: women-led revolts such as the Rani Cho-Ris uprising of 1878, the role of tribal leaders in the 1857 upsurge, and community participation in Gandhian satyagrahas such as flag and forest satyagraha.Visitors can revise what they saw through the AI--generated quiz corner. The galleries combine traditional materials — wood-carved entrances by Surguja artisans, sculptural tableaux of Veer Narayan Singh and other leaders — with projection mapping, VFX and interactive pods. QR-linked interpretive content allows visitors to access audio, translations and archival documents on their phones. AI as bridge and conservatorBeyond the galleries, the project connects to an expanding digital architecture that officials say will be central to preserving tribal languages and lore.

At the heart of this is Adi-Vaani, an AI-driven translation platform developed under the Ministry of Tribal Affairs that promises real-time translation between Hindi, English and tribal languages such as Mundari, Bhili, Gondi, Santhali, Garo and Kui. Adi-Vaani, proponents say, will help digitise oral traditions and enable researchers, teachers and community members to access indigenous narratives in familiar tongues.“The use of AI here is not to replace storytellers but to preserve their voices,” Borah said. By converting spoken tales into searchable, translatable text and audio, the platform aims to stop loss of linguistic heritage and to make local knowledge — agricultural systems, medicinal plant lore, ritual song — available for study and reuse.