User:Ssinghbhu/Department of Pali & Buddhist Studies, Banaras Hindu University (B.H.U.), Varanasi

New article name goes here new article content ...

External links

• example.com

INTRODUCTION: The Department of Pali and Buddhist Studies, Banaras Hindu University (B.H.U.), Varanasi is established in the proximity of Sarnath, the one of most sacred Buddhist pilgrimage site, where the Buddha delivered his first sermon famous as “Turning the wheel of Law”. Pali, the language of the oldest Buddhist canon “Tipitaka”is being taught in the Banaras Hindu University since 1940 and it was introduced as a subject in the Sanskrit department there because of the effort of Bhikshu Jagadish Kashyap, a Theravada Buddhist monk who played a significant role in the propagation of Pali studies in India during the post-colonial period. Bhikshu Jagadish Kashyap was introduced to Pandit Madan Mohan Malaviya, the founder of this university and Sarvepalli Radhakrishnan, the second Vice-chancellor by Yugal Kishore Birla, a noted industrialist of the then India and Kashyap could be successful persuading them to begin the study of Pali in the University. Bhikshu Kashyap would teach Pali for free in BHU and other financial responsibility were borne by Birla. The Department of Pali and Buddhist Studies became independent on July 31, 1982 having separated from the Department of Sanskrit in the Faculty of Arts. The first head of the Department was Dr. N.H. Samtani.

COURSES OFFERED: The Department of Pali and Buddhist Studies is running the following courses: Ph.D in Pali and Buddhist Studies: There are two semesters of six months each in a year for the Ph. D. programme, namely, Odd Semester: September- February and Even Semester: March – August. M.A. in Pali: It is of the period of Two Years i.e. Four semesters. B.A. (Hons.) in Pali: It is of the period of Three years i.e. Six Semesters. Diploma in Pali is conducted at Level I i.e Two Semesters and Level II i.e Two Semesters. Admission in Diploma is open for the non-students of BHU too. The department has the provision of Credit system for the evaluation and admissions in these courses begin in July every year, for which online forms may be submitted through the BHU’s website during March-April every year.

HEAD OF THE DEPARTMENT: Currently, Prof. Siddharth Singh is the Head of the Department since September1, 2013. Prof. Singh is a noted scholar of Pali and Buddhist Studies and has been awarded by the Fulbright Senior Research Fellowship, USA; Vadrayan Vyas President Award of India, and Japan Foundation Fellowship of Japan. He has presented papers and delivered speeches in the different esteemed universities and conferences of India and the countries like U.S.A, Japan, Sweden, Thailand, Myanmar, and Sri Lanka etc. He has got two books published namely, Saddhammasangaho (History of Buddhism till 13th Century) and Jinacarita (a biography of the Buddha), edited two books as a Guest Editor. He has the credit of writing more than forty national and international research papers and articles.

References: http://www.bhu.ac.in/arts/pali_buddist/

External Links: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Faculty_of_Arts,_BHU http://www.bhu.ac.in/ http://bhuonline.in/index.html