Exploring Cultural Heritage in VR: An Interactive Tour of the Majuli Island

This article presents a Virtual Reality (VR) tour designed to preserve the cultural heritage of Majuli Island, the world’s largest river island, located in northeastern India. Facing severe erosion from the Brahmaputra River, Majuli’s rich cultural heritage is at risk. Our VR tour aims to safeguard and showcase both tangible and intangible aspects of the island’s heritage using multimodal content, including 360-degree images, videos, drone footage, and textual information. The system features teleportation, virtual vehicles, maps for global and local navigation, and an interactive virtual tablet to enhance user experience. We discuss the design, implementation, and evaluation of the VR tour, with a study of N = 27 participants to assess user presence, the effectiveness of capturing Majuli’s heritage, and any cybersickness. Results show that the VR tour successfully represented the island’s heritage and provided a strong sense of presence, but also led to increased oculomotor symptoms after the tour. This immersive VR experience aims to preserve Majuli’s cultural legacy for future generations.