A Life Dedicated to Indian Intellectual Traditions:
An Interview with Prof. Vashisht Narayana Jha by Shivanand Kanavi
Prof.
V.N. Jha (b. 1946) is an eminent Sanskrit scholar renowned for his
multidisciplinary approach, making ancient Indian knowledge systems relevant to
contemporary studies. A former Director of the Centre of Advanced Study in
Sanskrit, University of Pune, he was also the founding Chairman of the Centre
for Sanskrit Studies at JNU.
His expertise spans
Veda, Vyākaraṇa, Nyāya, and Mīmāṃsā. Prof. Jha pioneered new academic
disciplines by creating innovative courses in Sanskrit Linguistics and Indian
Logic & Epistemology. A prolific author, he has contributed over 45 books
and 100 research articles and supervised 35 PhD students.
He
has been a visiting professor at universities in Japan, Germany, Switzerland,
and Mauritius, promoting Indian intellectual traditions globally. Honoured with
titles like ‘Sanskrit Mahāmahopādhyāya’ and ‘Vācaspati’, his life's work,
continued through the Rishi Rina Trust, is dedicated to reviving scholarly
interest in India's profound philosophical heritage through intensive workshops
and textual study.
Shivanand Kanavi: Sir, Namaskara. It gives me great
pleasure to speak with you. I have been attending your lectures and workshops
for over eight years and have greatly benefited from your knowledge and unique
style of teaching. I’ve seen you in at least six or seven workshops, each with
40-50 students from all over India and abroad.
You teach with immense empathy, whether the
student is a PhD scholar, a faculty member, or a complete novice like me with
no background in Sanskrit. You patiently explain complex concepts and answer
all our questions. I am very grateful.
I would like our audience to know about your
journey. What attracted you to Bharatiya Darshanas? How did it all begin?
Prof. V.N. Jha: I hail from West Bengal, from a small
town called Raiganj. I was born on July 20, 1946. My family originally came
from a village in Dinajpur district, which became part of East Pakistan after
Partition. Anticipating this, my father moved us to Raiganj before partition.
I never attended primary school. In those
days, it was optional, and education often began at home. One day, my
grandfather decided I was ready for high school. He took me to a primary school
headmaster, Gopal Chandra Mandal, to assess if I could be admitted directly
into Class 5. The headmaster asked me a few questions, and I must have answered
satisfactorily because he advised my father to admit me directly to high
school.
I joined the famous Coronation High School in
Raiganj. From Class 5, we had Sanskrit. My Sanskrit teacher, Sita Kanta
Acharya, became my real guru. Seeing me in traditional dress, he took a special
interest. After class, he invited me to his home. He had me play with his children
for an hour, and then at 6 PM sharp, my studies would begin.
He ran a traditional pathshala called
Madhusudana Chatushpathi, where the four Vedas were taught. He was a great
grammarian. This is how I was introduced to the traditional method of learning
Sanskrit and the Shastras. My grandfather used to recite Ashtadhyayi and
Amarkosha every morning, so I had already absorbed much of it passively. My
formal training began under Sita Kanta Acharya, and I progressed through the
traditional levels, earning titles like Nyayacharya Tirtha and Veda Tirtha
while still in school.
Simultaneously, my father was a devotee of the
Gaudiya Math, an ashram on the bank of the river near our house. Every morning,
we would go for the aarti. A scholar there, Surendranath Das, would gather the
children afterwards and teach us Sanskrit, Mathematics, and English—completely
outside the school syllabus. This selfless work ignited a deep interest in
these subjects, especially mathematics.
After higher secondary, I went to college and,
without telling my father, took admission in Mathematics Honours. My father’s
friend, a Sanskrit professor at the same college, Ligon’s College (now a
university), informed him. My father took me to college and changed my course.
A compromise was reached: I did my graduation with Sanskrit Honours and
Mathematics as a subsidiary subject.
After graduation, my father wanted me to go to
Kashi. I went to Banaras Hindu University (BHU) and did my MA in Sanskrit with
a Vedic group. There, a teacher noticed my interest in language and structure
and advised me to do another MA in Comparative Philology. I sought my father’s
permission, and he encouraged me to keep studying. So, I went to Calcutta
University for another MA.
This exposed me to the European perspective on
Sanskrit—historical linguistics, the Indo-European language family, and the
Aryan invasion theory. It gave me a new vision to complement my traditional
training.
After my exams, I took a job as a Sanskrit
professor at a new college in the Sundarbans. But then I saw an advertisement
for a Centre of Advanced Study in Sanskrit at the University of Pune, offering
scholarships for a PhD. I applied, was selected, and resigned from my job to
move to Pune in 1968.
For my PhD, I wanted to work on the Padapatha
of the Rigveda by Shakalya. To break the continuous Samhita text into
individual words (Padapatha), Shakalya must have had a deep knowledge of
grammar—a grammar that is pre-Paninian. My goal was to reconstruct that
grammatical knowledge. My guide, the great linguist A.M. Ghatge, directed me to
work under the renowned grammarian Prof. S.D. Joshi at Pune University. This
work allowed me to understand not just the history of the Sanskrit language but
the history of Indian grammatical thought.
After submitting my thesis, S.M. Katre, the
director of Deccan College, invited me to join a massive UNESCO project:
the Dictionary of Sanskrit on Historical Principles. Working there,
I met two stalwarts who truly shaped my intellectual journey: Shivaram Krishna
Shastri, a grammarian and Mimamsaka, and Srinivas Shastri, a Naiyayika and
Vedantin. For 17 years, I studied under them, reading texts line by line—Sutra,
Bhashya, Vritti, Tikā—understanding the entire history of thought in these
systems. I would translate what I learned into English and have them verify it
the next day. This shifted my focus from pure grammar to Mimamsa, Nyaya, and
other Darshanas.
Later, Prof. S.D. Joshi created a post for
Indian Logic at Pune University and invited me to join. I did and eventually
became the director of the Centre of Advanced Studies in Sanskrit, serving for
20 years until 2006.
In 2001-2002, I took two years' leave to
establish the Centre for Sanskrit Studies at Jawaharlal Nehru University (JNU)
at the invitation of then-Chancellor Karan Singh.
My work also took me abroad. In 1988, I taught
Indian Logic at Humboldt University in Berlin. I had collaborations with
universities in Japan (Nagoya, Tokyo, Osaka) due to the strong interest in
Japan in the Bouddha -Nyaya dialogue. I also taught as a visiting professor in
Mauritius and at the University of Lucerne in Switzerland.
Shivanand Kanavi: This is a fascinating journey. When and
why did the idea of establishing the Rishi Rina Trust come about?
Prof. V.N. Jha: The idea came from a deep-seated pain.
From my childhood, I was exposed to these profound knowledge systems.
Simultaneously, I was in the modern education stream. I could see the clarity
and depth in our traditional systems, like Sanskrit grammar, which was often missing
elsewhere.
I always felt this knowledge should be made
available to everyone and integrated into mainstream education. At the Centre
of Advanced Studies, I created new courses like an MA in Sanskrit Linguistics
and an MA in Indian Logical Epistemology, designed to be 50% traditional and
50% modern. The goal was to start a dialogue between the two traditions.
Unfortunately, the university system was often
resistant to such reform. The then UGC Chairman once heard me lecture and asked
me to design a common course for all Sanskrit departments in India, I worked
hard to create it but sadly it wasn't implemented. Teachers weren't trained to
teach it.
My wife, Prof. Ujjwala Jha, who was also a
scholar of Nyaya, Veda, and Buddhism, told me that we could not depend on the
system Sanskrit studies in our Universities to reform themselves despite all
our effort but we have to share what we had learned. Thus, we established the
Rishi Rina Trust.
The name is significant. In Dharmashastra, we
speak of three debts (rina): to the sages (rishi), to the
ancestors (pitr), and to the gods (deva). The only way to repay
the debt to the sages is to teach what you have learned from your guru. This
is rishi rina. That is the trust's mission: to repay our debt by
disseminating this knowledge.
Through the trust, we conduct workshops all
over the country and abroad, focusing on textual study of original texts in
Sanskrit. We have covered all six Astika (Vedic) Darshanas. But a true
understanding requires dialogue with Nastika (non-Vedic) systems like Charvaka
(classical Indian materialism), Buddhism and Jainism as well. Our tradition
itself created models for such dialogue, like Vatsyayana's method, which
focuses on four points of discussion to find common ground without sacrificing
one's worldview.
Shivanand Kanavi: In the last 20-25 years, how many such
workshops have you conducted?
Prof. V.N. Jha: I have lost count. Every year, we
conduct many. Each has pver 40 students from diverse backgrounds. The response
has been very encouraging.
Shivanand Kanavi: People often have prejudices about
Indian philosophy—that it is dogmatic, other-worldly, or was restricted to a
certain caste. How do you address this?
Prof. V.N. Jha: These notions exist out of ignorance, a
lack of exposure. If you actually study a small text, you will see these claims
are false. The very existence of multiple interpretations of the same
Upanishads—Shankara, Ramanuja, Madhva, Nimbaraka—proves that rationality and
debate were celebrated, not suppressed. There was immense freedom of thought.
The purpose of Darshana is not just philosophy
(love of wisdom) but realization and transformation—to create a better, more
empathetic human being who can see unity in diversity. This knowledge is
holistic and human-centric.
Even if there were restrictions on who is
eligible to study these systems in the past, today, anyone can learn it. There
are no restrictions. In our workshops, we have people from all communities, faiths
and often more women than men. The knowledge is there for anyone who is
curious.
Furthermore, only about 5% of Sanskrit
literature is "scriptural"; the other 95% is secular—covering
mathematics, law, medicine, aesthetics, and politics. The analytical tools
developed in Nyaya or the algorithmic structure of Panini's grammar are
incredibly relevant for fields like computer science and law. I taught Nyaya to
law students for 16 years, training them to distill court judgments into the
five-step Nyaya syllogism. This sharpens their logic, language, and discourse skills.
We lost this because we kept importing
educational models from outside that had no connection to our cultural and
intellectual strengths. We have to blame ourselves, not Macaulay. It is our
responsibility to reintroduce this into mainstream education.
Shivanand Kanavi: Your point about the need for dialogue
is crucial. The traditional method of vada, which requires first
understanding the opponent's view (purvapaksha) is really absent today's
chaotic debates especially in the media and polity.
Prof. V.N. Jha: Absolutely. Vada aims
at arriving at the truth. The other forms, jalpa (quibbling)
and vitanda (destructive criticism), are what we see today.
The Navya-Nyaya scholars even developed a precise, technical language to avoid
the ambiguities of natural language during debate—a concept incredibly relevant
in today's world of computer science and machine learning.
This knowledge can teach us how to disagree
respectfully and intelligently. That is what we need today.
Shivanand Kanavi: Thank you so much, Sir, for sharing your
incredible journey and insights.
Prof. V.N. Jha: Thank you. My only request is: become a
volunteer. Learn Indian intellectual traditions. Don't depend on secondary
sources. Go to the original texts. And share your knowledge and understanding.
This is the only way to repay our debt to the rishis.
For those interested in Prof. Jha's work and the workshops,
please visit: www.vidyavatika.org
Shivanand Kanavi, is a theoretical
physicist, business journalist and former Vice President at TCS. He is the author of the
award winning book Sand
to Silicon: The Amazing Story Of Digital Technology and
edited Research by Design:
Innovation and TCS. Can be reached at skanavi@gmail.com
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