Santiniketan: The Rabindra Bhavan of Visva-Bharati has decided to purchase a piano for researchers of Rabindra Sangeet from the country and abroad as well as for Sangeet Bhavan students as there is no piano in the varsity for the past ten years.

Visva-Bharati officials said despite having a full fledged music school - Sangeet Bhavana -no piano other than that belonged to Tagore, which the varsity has been preserving for a decade now, exists.

The old piano was gifted to Rabindranath Tagore by a Dutch musician in 1922.

Varsity sources said the new piano would cost around Rs 1.30 lakh and will be kept at Rabindra Bhavana's Bichitra Hall which houses the museum, library and archives of Tagore.

"The existing piano has became old and we are preserving it at Tagore's house at Udayan in the Uttarayan complex for over a decade. We are not allowing researchers to use it. So, we discussed with three senior Sangeet Bhavana professors about the need to have a piano and they agreed. The new piano will also help students who are learning Rabindra Sangeet apart from researchers from the country and abroad," said Nilanjan Banerjee, special officer of Rabindra Bhavana.

Despite, different instruments like esraj, tabla and sitar is taught in Sangeet Bhavana, there is no course in piano.

"In future we have a plan to start a new course in piano also," Sabuj Koli Sen, the officiating vice chancellor of Visva-Bharati, said.

The new piano will be introduced through a programme on September 18 .