Latest news with #Sanskrit
Hans India
9 hours ago
- General
- Hans India
Jagannath Ratha Yatra celebrated with devotion at NSU
Tirupati: Under the aegis of the Odisha Chair at the National Sanskrit University, Sri Jagannath Culture and Chaitanya Philosophy Research Centre organised a grand Jagannath Rath Yatra on Friday. The event witnessed vibrant participation from students, faculty and devotees. Chief guest Rupeswar Chaitanya Prabhu, Vice-President of ISKCON temple, Tirupati, graced the occasion and spoke on the spiritual significance of the Rath Yatra. He prayed for Lord Jagannath's blessings upon the university and its well-wishers. University Registrar Kadiyam Venkata Narayana Rao ceremoniously placed the deities on the chariot, expressing the university's commitment to promoting Indian culture and spiritual knowledge through Sanskrit education. He invoked Lord Jagannath's grace for the university, Andhra Pradesh, and the entire nation. Academic Dean Prof Rajanikant Shukla encouraged students and the public to participate with devotion and receive divine blessings. Dean of Students' Welfare Prof S Dakshinamurthy Sarma further highlighted the grandeur of the Rath Yatra. Odisha Chair Director Dr Gyanaranjan Panda explained that the Jagannath Research Centre helps students explore the unique traditions of Lord Jagannath and Chaitanya philosophy. He remarked that just like in Puri, the Rath Yatra is celebrated with equal fervour here. The procession, starting from the university's Jagannath temple, passed through key streets of Tirupati before returning, spreading spiritual joy. The event was attended by University Finance Officer Prof Radha Govinda Tripathi, Odisha Chair Advisor Prof G Sankara Barayana, Chief Warden Prof P Venkata Rao, G Seetha Mahalakshmi and others.
Scroll.in
10 hours ago
- Entertainment
- Scroll.in
In Bengaluru, an ancient play finds new voice in the world's oldest living dramatic tradition
A celebrated courtesan is being chased across the streets of Ujjayini by the king's boorish brother-in-law and his thugs. She takes shelter in the home of a noble, impoverished and much-married Brahmin she is smitten with. To ensure another rendezvous she leaves her jewellery behind in his son's toy cart. But her attendant's lover steals this bundle and the Brahmin is falsely implicated. Several hairy twists later, there is a happy ending for all the good people. Along the way, the inept king is overthrown in a coup by a herdsman, the courtesan is murdered but revealed to be alive, and her beloved is saved from the noose at the last moment. For good measure, there are stormy nights and elephant fights. For over 2,000 years, Shudraka's action-packed Sanskrit play Mrchhakatika (the little clay cart) – and its plot woven with love, intrigue, crime, satire, caste and class inequities, politics, and human follies – has enthralled readers and theatre lovers. Noted for combining the grand sweep of Shakespeare with the fine irony of Moliere, the play maintains a perennial appeal despite its vintage. This is not your usual Sanskrit classic dealing with gods, damsels, apsaras, myths and nobility – it is peopled by gamblers, rascals, philanderers, drunks, avaricious rulers, scheming lovers, bhikshus and priests. It is set not in a forest, palace or celestial realm but in a bustling Indian city in ancient times. And, in a realistic portrayal of the time, all but five elite characters – who speak Sanskrit – slip into the subaltern languages of the time, such as Prakrit. There are neither black nor white characters in Mrchhakatika. As Sanskrit scholar William Ryder points out in the introduction to his 1905 translation of the play, what you find in Shudraka's works are cosmopolitan characters who are 'citizens of the world'. Ever since the Orientalists discovered the play around 200 years ago, the saga of Vasantasena and Charudatta's trials and travails has travelled the world and been translated widely into Indian and global languages. A popular script, it was turned into desi and western operas, and presented several times on silver screen in multiple languages. Most famously, it became the lush Girish Karnad film Utsav. Next week, Mrchhakatika will be staged in the world's oldest living dramatic tradition that claims a vintage as old as the play itself – koodiyattam, the Sanskrit theatre form from Kerala. Directed by scholar and choreographer G Venu, Mrchhakatikam will come alive at Bengaluru's Ranga Shankara theatre, its 10 acts compressed into about two hours. 'It is a very strong play for its time and the writing is remarkable,' said Venu. 'Shudraka's concerns are very progressive – he talks of revolt and inequalities. And I would describe Vasantasena as a feminist, and an important figure in the city where the play is set.' Adapted for the first time for koodiyattam, the play marks a departure from the form's focus on mythological epics such as the Ramayana and Mahabharata. For koodiyattam artiste Kapila Venu, who will be playing Vasantasena, this is what makes Mrchhakatikam an invigorating experience. 'I find it liberating playing her because she does not fit that subservient stereotype,' she said. 'Vasantasena is contradictory, she is wealthy, intelligent, beautiful and has agency. She does not succumb to the powerful and is drawn to Charudatta because he, like her, is kind and generous. When I play Sita or Shakuntala I am required to bring lajja (shyness) to the character. Here, I love that I get to keep my chin up at all times.' Sooraj Nambiar, the koodiyattam artiste who plays Charudatta, says Mrchhakatikam is at heart a very current and a very political play. In koodiyattam, where characters are costumed very differently to indicate their high levels of virtuousness or infamy, the characters in the play will be wearing almost similar costumes to mark their ordinariness. 'Charudatta, for example, is an even-tempered man – he is not very expressive and that calls for subtlety,' he said. 'And even more unusually, it is not he who approaches the nayika with declarations of love or expression of desire. It is she who embraces him first.' Fact and fiction There is an ongoing debate over who the playwright Shudraka was. Some like Sanskrit scholar MR Kale believe that he was a king-playwright of the southern Andhrabhrityas dynasty. Others have concluded that he belonged to the nomadic Abhira (herdsman) dynasty and lived and ruled somewhere in modern-day Maharashtra. There are others still who claim that he was a Brahmin king of Ujjain. As for the play's vintage, there is no agreement on that either – estimates place Shudraka between Kalidasa (4-5 CE) and Bhasa (3 CE). But Kale, in his 1926 work The Mrichchhakatika of Sudraka, dated him and his work even earlier – 2BC – arguing that the references to astrology, Buddhist institutions and figures and the Sanskrit itself should mark it as an older play. What is generally agreed upon is that the play combines historical facts with fiction and likely that Shudraka had a ring-side view of the factual events, presumably as a ruler. The revolt of the herdsman Aryaka against the cruel king Palaka, Kale points out, could hark back to a historical putsch after the death of Buddha. The play has stood the test of time well, having lent itself easily to translation. It was in 1826 that it was first rendered in English by Horace Wilson, an employee of the British East India Company. This was followed by French and German translations. The play bill for an 1895 French stage adaptation, Le Chariot de Terre Cuite, was designed by painter-illustrator Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec. There are records of its performance in other parts of Europe in the late 19th century and in England, where it has seen countless productions. In India itself, the play has seen adaptations in several languages, especially Marathi, Telugu, Bengali and Hindi. Activist and reformer Kamaladevi Chattopadhyay played Vasantasena in a silent Kannada film by the same name in 1931. But one of the most inventive and contemporary adaptations of Mrchhakatika was Habib Tanvir's 1958 play Mitti ki Gadi, in which he first drew on the folk traditions of Chhattisgarh. 'It was at a 2002 show of his play that Tanvir and I spoke of the play's possibilities for koodiyattam,' said Venu. 'By that time we had done the first act of Shakuntala and he had been very appreciative of it. But starting any new production from scratch in koodiyattam is a very tough task.' Koodiyattam is an art of extreme rigour. A ritual art that historians argue became the exclusive preserve of Brahminical groups around 9-12 CE, koodiyattam is a highly codified, arcane and stylised form where actors' manuals (attaprakaram) outline characters. The enactment, recalling past histories (nirvahanam) sometimes to the beginning of time, and painstakingly detailed character minutiae, lasts not over hours but days and weeks. Scholar David Shulman, in a lyrical essay for The New York Review of Books in 2012, wrote of the experience of watching a 29-night performance of a single act from the Ramayana. Of the form's refusal to fast forward even in an attention-starved world, he said: 'I think I live my life in this constant rush toward death, almost never allowing a single movement of the body, or a single passing thought of any power or novelty, or even a single deep breath or tender gesture, to complete itself without being cut off too soon. I suppose that in this I am hardly alone. Kudiyattam is profoundly, perhaps uniquely, therapeutic in this respect.' With the passage of time, many things have changed in the art: it is no longer exclusive to one community, it has stepped out of temple grounds, and increasingly the needs of the modern audience are kept in mind when the length of the exposition is decided. Sudha Gopalakrishnan, the koodiyattam scholar who was among the experts to argue for the form's inclusion in UNESCO's intangible heritage list, says the change is both welcome and unsettling. 'The plot itself is secondary in koodiyattam, which is what marks it apart from realistic theatre,' she said. 'Its crux is about how you arrest a small moment and use multiple sources and contexts to elaborate it. The trend of adapting it for contemporary context – editing for time and content – started in the 1940s and 1950s with Painkulam Rama Chakyar. But I think this will likely become even more prominent in the coming years.'
Time of India
20 hours ago
- Science
- Time of India
Raiganj univ scientists discover new species of soil bacteria
1 2 3 Malda: Researchers at Bengal's Raiganj University have discovered a new species of soil bacteria that exhibits strong antimicrobial properties and significantly enhances seed germination, indicating its immense potential in promoting plant health and productivity. The bacterium was isolated from the rhizosphere of mulberry plants, a key component of the region's sericulture and farming systems. The newly discovered species has been named Bacillus ayatagriensis, inspired by the name of the lead scientist Amit Kumar Mandal's daughter Aayat. The name combines "Aayat", derived in Sanskrit as "Ayata" and "Krishi", meaning agriculture. You Can Also Check: Kolkata AQI | Weather in Kolkata | Bank Holidays in Kolkata | Public Holidays in Kolkata The study was conducted in the field of applied microbiology under the leadership of Mandal from the department of sericulture. He was joined by an interdisciplinary team comprising Sandip Das, Rittick Mondal, Pankaj Mandal, Shubhajit Shaw, Joydeep Chakraborty, Debnirmalya Gangopadhyay and Abdul Sadat. The group of scientists conducted a comprehensive analysis of the bacterium's bioactive potential, laying the groundwork for future applications in eco-friendly agriculture. The discovery marks the first official report of a novel microbial species from Raiganj University and has already found a place in renowned journals such as Scientific Reports. by Taboola by Taboola Sponsored Links Sponsored Links Promoted Links Promoted Links You May Like Trending in in 2025: Local network access control [Click Here] Esseps Learn More Undo Durlabh Sarkar, registrar of the university, said, "It is a great achievement by Mandal and his team which will encourage students in this part of the world." Lead scientist Mandal said, "As Bacillus ayatagriensis enters scientific literature, it stands as more than a promising tool for green agriculture. It becomes a symbol — of love, legacy and profound connections between scientific progress and human values."
Time of India
21 hours ago
- General
- Time of India
Bangalore University defends tree removal, pledges environmental compliance
Bengaluru: Following public protest over removal of trees for the construction of a new academic building, Bangalore University defended its move saying construction is being carried out in full compliance with regulations. At a press conference on Friday, vice-chancellor Jayakara Shetty said: "While reports claimed 419 trees would be cut, in reality, only 282 trees are being affected — of which 169 are eucalyptus and acacia species. The remaining 137 trees, located in the buffer zone, will be preserved. Additionally, the smaller trees will be transplanted nearby. All construction is being carried out in full compliance with legal and environmental regulations," he said. The university officials also criticised the protests against the construction by outsiders: "The university is an academic space, not a public ground. The university will not tolerate any form of coercion by outsiders. So far, we have remained silent, but we will discuss the issue concerning the walkers' association in the upcoming syndicate meeting and initiate legal action. No protests or rallies will be permitted on the campus, and this has been brought to the attention of the police for appropriate action and preventive measures. " You Can Also Check: Bengaluru AQI | Weather in Bengaluru | Bank Holidays in Bengaluru | Public Holidays in Bengaluru BU also listed the measures they are taking to protect the environment. "The university will plant 10 saplings for every tree removed. BU has already planted over 6 lakh saplings of 300 species across its campus since 1998. Under PM-USHA scheme, Rs 8 crore has been earmarked for decarbonisation and environmental protection, including LED street lighting across campus, promotion of electric vehicles and bicycles, construction of rainwater harvesting systems, and establishment of a nature interpretation centre," he said. BOX: Some PG programmes closed for this year Following low admissions, three post graduate programmes will be dropped for this academic year in BU. Molecular biology, solid waste management and disaster management received less than 10 admissions for academic year 2025-26. Thus, these programmes will not function for this year. There are over 52 post graduate departments in the university. Programmes like Sanskrit, Telugu, audiology, speech and language, Hindi, corporate communication, constitution and administration, labour employment, international business, Urdu, dance, music, geographical information and life science have lost popularity over the years. The syndicate had decided that courses with less than 10 admissions should be closed down so as to not burden the university.
Time of India
a day ago
- Business
- Time of India
9 Indian-origin CEOs leading global companies: Where they studied
Sundar Pichai and Satya Nadella Indian-origin leaders have risen to helm some of the world's most influential corporations—from Google to Chanel—leveraging rigorous Indian education and global experiences to drive innovation and growth. Their journeys spotlight the power of strong academic foundations in shaping visionary leadership. These nine executives exemplify this trend. Each brings a unique story of engineering prowess, business acumen, and cultural adaptability. Their careers illustrate how education at both Indian and international institutions can fuel extraordinary global impact. Sundar Pichai Born June 10, 1972 in Madurai, Tamil Nadu. Son of Lakshmi (stenographer) and Regunatha Pichai (electrical engineer). Raised in Chennai, he attended IIT Kharagpur ( Metallurgy), Stanford (M.S.), and Wharton (MBA). Now CEO of Google (since 2015) & Alphabet (since 2019), residing in California. Satya Nadella Born August 19, 1967 in Hyderabad to Prabhavati (Sanskrit lecturer) and Bukkapuram Nadella Yugandhar (IAS officer). Alumnus of Hyderabad Public School and Manipal Institute (B.E.), followed by an M.S. at University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee and MBA from Chicago Booth. CEO & Chairman of Microsoft, currently based in Redmond, USA. Shantanu Narayen Born May 27, 1963 in Hyderabad to a plastics-business father and literature-professor mother. Studied Electronics Engineering at Osmania University, followed by an M.S. in Computer Science (Bowling Green State) and MBA from UC Berkeley Haas. CEO & Chairman of Adobe since 2007, living in California. Ajay Banga Born November 10, 1959 in Khadki, Pune into an Indian Army family; father Lt-Gen Harbhajan Banga. Studied at Delhi University (B.A. Economics) and IIM Ahmedabad (MBA). Former CEO of MasterCard, now President of World Bank (since June 2023), based in Washington, D.C. Arvind Krishna Born November 23, 1962 in West Godavari, Andhra Pradesh. Son of parents with military-related background . Trained at IIT Kanpur ( and University of Illinois (Ph.D. EE). Joined IBM in 1990, now CEO (since 2020) and Chairman (since 2021), living in New York metro area. George Kurian Born 1967 in Kottayam, Kerala. Studied B.S.E.E. at Princeton and M.S. E.E./C.S. at Stanford. Joined NetApp in 2011 and became CEO in June 2015, now leading enterprise data systems from Silicon Valley. Nikesh Arora Born February 9, 1968 in Ghaziabad; son of an Indian Air Force officer. Studied at The Air Force School (Subroto Park), IIT-BHU ( EE), Boston College and Northeastern (MBA). CEO & Chairman of Palo Alto Networks since June 2018, based in California. Leena Nair Born June 11, 1969 in Kolhapur, Maharashtra. Obtained B.E. in Electronics from Walchand College and gold-medalist MBA from XLRI Jamshedpur. Previously CHRO at Unilever, now CEO of Chanel since January 2022, residing in Paris. Ravi Kumar S Born in India (Mumbai region); educational credentials include B.E. from Shivaji University and MBA from Xavier Institute of Management, Bhubaneswar. Served as President at Infosys (2016–2022), became CEO of Cognizant in January 2023, currently based in New Jersey area. Is your child ready for the careers of tomorrow? Enroll now and take advantage of our early bird offer! Spaces are limited.
