On April 25-26, 2014, the International Conference "Cultural Heritage of the Cham People of Vietnam: Ecological, Cultural and Artistic Historical Traditions" was held in Delhi, organized by the National Center for the Arts. Indira Gandhi National Centre for the Arts, Janpath, Delhi; http://ignca.nic.in/; http://ignca.nic.in/cham_art_heritage_2014.htm). The organizing committee was headed by Dr. Bachchan Kumar. The conference was inspired by the State Professor of India Sachchidanand Sahai, one of the leading experts on the history of pre-Angkor Cambodia and Ramayana mythology in Southeast Asia.

The conference was attended by about 50 scientists from India, Vietnam, Cambodia, Malaysia, Singapore, Hungary, and Russia.

Champa is a country in Central Vietnam, created by the Chams, a Malay-Polynesian language group of the Austronesian language family, and shares the same name as the capital of the ancient Indian kingdom of Anga (present-day Bhagalpur in the Ganges state of Bihar), located east of Magadha on the river trade route. The conference in India aimed to show the comprehensive impact of ancient Indian civilization on the people of Southeast Asia and create a basis for cooperation between India and Vietnam to preserve the cultural heritage of Champa.

Since Champa was conquered by the Vietnamese, its history was not in the spotlight of the Vietnamese government until the ancient temple complexes of Myeson and Dong Zong were turned into UNESCO World Heritage Sites. Indian researchers, following the coryphaeus of the history of Southeast Asia and India, R. C. Majumdar, see the Indianized kingdoms of Indochina and Indonesia as colonies of their ancestors. Therefore, the conference had a certain political subtext-to emphasize the role of India in the history of Vietnam through the history of Champa.

Nguyen Thanh Tan, Ambassador of the Socialist Republic of Vietnam, and Philippe Delang, a Belgian expert on UNESCO cultural programs from Cambodia, took part in the conference to demonstrate a serious approach to the development of Indo-Vietnamese programs for the preservation and development of Vietnam's Hindu heritage. Among the recommendations adopted at the end of the conference was the promotion of Indian-Vietnamese cooperation in preserving the cultural heritage of Champa.

The conference was opened by chants of Indian students in Sanskrit and Buddhist monks from Cambodia in Pali. Dipoli Krishna, Secretary of the Indira Gandhi National Center for the Arts, gave a welcoming speech.S. Sahai outlined the concept of the conference and described the history and culture of Champa in India and Southeast Asia. The participants were welcomed by Vietnam's Ambassador to India Nguyen Thanh Tan, President of the Sri Chihuahua Garekhan National Center, and Dr. Kapila Vatsyayan.

The conference included 8 sections: "Architectural Connections", "Champa Buddhist Art", "Ecology and Ethnicity in Cham Art", "Interface of Cham Culture", "Champa Art and Architecture in relation to India and Southeast Asia", " Society and Religion in the reflection of Cham Art", "Studying the way of life and folk art", "Champa's Sanskrit heritage". A number of sections were held in parallel, so it was not possible to listen to all the reports.

The author of the review was invited to lead the session of the second section "Buddhist Art of Champa" on April 25. Vikram Lall (India) in his report "Dongziong in the context of Buddhist architectural traditions of Southeast Asia" showed the similarity of the layout of Dongziong and Pagan temples, noting the differences in construction equipment: in Champa, a false brick vault was used to build the roof, in Pagan they knew the technique of erecting a real vault.

A significant part of the reports of Indian scholars provided an overview of the mythological and religious content in the architecture, sculpture and inscriptions of Champa, with a predominant focus on Hinduism. The authors of many reports, as a rule, did not take into account local beliefs.

At the same time, it was Indian scholars who showed that the Sanskrit inscriptions of Champa or the Sanskrit parts of its bilingual inscriptions can be recited aloud, that these are poetic texts intended for recitative.

Two presentations were made by the famous French epigraphist Claude Jacques, who now works in Hungary. I was able to listen to one of them, "Relations between Champa and Cambodia in the XI-XI centuries" (during the other, I led a section meeting). Jacques showed that it is not possible to talk about the conquest of Champa by the Lngkor Empire or the conquest of the Angkor Empire by Champa, but rather to talk about the involvement of two states in each other's affairs, about the struggle between different groups of princes, among which there were both Chams and Khmers on each side.

Thanh Phan (Vietnam) in his report "Spoken and written Cham languages" showed the evolution of Cham writing: from one of the early Pallava Brahmi variants to their own writing system. Stephen Murphy (Singapore) identified cultural links between Champa and Dvaravati in the eighth and tenth centuries.

Tran Ki Phin (Vietnam) demonstrated the results of recent archaeological research in the Vietnamese province of Quang Nam and showed the specifics of the iconography of deities from Mison, caused by the influence of Cham architecture itself on the borrowed Indian culture.

A. O. Zakharov (Russia) in his report "Has the early history of Champa really been revised?" proved that in the VI-VIII centuries there was a unified political system centered in the Thubon River Valley, where Myeon and Dong Zong are located, covering a significant territory of Central Vietnam. The borders of Champa were mobile, but there is no evidence that Champa at that time consisted of disparate principalities.

Phan Anh Tu (Vietnam) spoke about new statues of Hindu gods found in Binh Dinh province. Mohamad Zain Musa (Malaysia) revealed continuity in the perception of royal power among the Chams: the Islamic concept of power retained many features of pre-Islamic, Hindu, and royal concepts.

Chairman of the International Academy of Indian Culture Prof. Lokesh Chandra (India) and Secretary of the Eastern Division of the Ministry of External Affairs Sri Anil Wadhwa. The recommendations of the conference on further cooperation in studying the history of Champa and preserving its rich cultural heritage were unanimously adopted. The next conference on the same topic is planned to be organized in Vietnam, in Mison, with the support of the Vietnamese Government and UNESCO.

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