Iran's Zoroastrian high priest in India on 1st official visit, focus on cultural ties

Indicating a significant expansion to India-Iran cultural relations, a high priest from Iran is on an official visit to India, for the first time in five centuries.

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Mobed Mehraban Pouladi, the president of the Council of Iranian Mobeds (priests), is on a ten-day visit to India. He is being hosted by the Zoroastrian community, known as the Parsis.

In the 8th century, Parsis came to India from Iran, then called Persia. The two communities – some 20,000 in Iran and some 80,000 in India -- continued to have cultural links, however, an official visit of the high priest did not happen till now.

Pouladi was quoted in the media saying “this is the first time since Nariman Hoshang’s journey to Iran (in 1500’s) that I decided to travel on an official visit to India and see how the Parsis here perform their rituals and ceremonies”. Hoshang, a resident of Gujarat had gone to Iran to study religious practices.

Pouladi’s schedule includes Mumbai and travel to south Gujarat village of Udvada to visit the ancient fire temple and to Navsari.

With Pouladi aiming to foster ‘collaboration’ between the two communities for joint initiatives and meetings between Indian and Iranian priests on an international platform, the door is open for Indian diplomacy to step-in.

As part of the outreach towards the Parsis, in March this year, the Mumbai University (MU) and the Union Ministry of Minority Affairs decided to establish ‘Avesta Pahlavi’ study centre to study the Parsi-Zoroastrian culture. The university and the Ministry signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU).

India’s cultural relations with Tehran include Persian language teaching.  In January this year, External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar, during a visit to Iran, announced that the government has decided to include Farsi (Persian) as one of the nine classical languages in India under the New Education Policy.

Iranian, that is led by its supreme leader – a cleric of the Shia Muslim community, has had civilisational links for more than four thousand years.

Some of the well-known Indian business families – the Tata’s, the Godrej’s, the Mistry’s, the Wadia’s and Poonawala’s – are Parsis by faith.