Sunday, April 21, 2013

Sanskrit - Opportunities for students

When we say Sanskrit, people generally think of Kalidasa and the likes, which fall in the category of Literature (sahitya) and not Science (shaastra). Sanskrit Shaastras require the study of Vyakarana (grammar). Due to the wrong perception that Grammar is difficult, etc. which is carried over during the past three generations in India and also due to economic compulsions which require the study of English, we have moved away from this wonderfully scientific language and the shastras - which are the largest storehouse of great scientific treatises unsurpassed till 1920. Since then many original scientific texts of Sanskrit are translated to English and also those were in German /French - thus now English holds the highest Scientific treatises - still Sanskrit comes as a second largest storehouse of scientific texts and many are still in manuscript form !
Unlike English, Sanskrit has entirely original Scientific thoughts and concepts - In English till 1920s most works are translations from other languages.

The five Shastra (science) disciplines that are popular in Sanskrit are 1. Ayurveda, 2. Sanskrit Computational Linguistics, 3. Yoga, 4. Manuscriptology, 5. Mathematics.

Rashtriya Sanskrit Samsthan University - 10 campuses spread across the country, and 15 Exclusive Sanskrit universities (totalling 26 university campuses), 3 Yoga universities, over 30 Sanskrit colleges, and over 20 Ayurvedic colleges. All are requiring people with various Sanskrit Shastra background as well as aspiring students

In addition to the above Sanskrit pundits are also in demand with respect to Jyotisha and also to teach Vedanta and Natyashastra - this is particularly required as today people blindly quote many Vedantic texts without any proper study or understanding of the original text. Also Phalita Jyotisha (predictive astrology) - the word Jyotisha means Astronomy - all these also needs basic Sanskrit knowledge

All these things need to be communicated to aspiring college entrants those who are bright yet couldn't get into Engineering /Medicine etc. Particularly Ayurveda and Computational Linguistics fields hold good career path as a mainstream or as an alternative career option for such students, other shastras are also equally in demand.

The above are specific to opportunities in Science including Health science in the universities and colleges alone. In addition to these Research positions in 3 Sanskrit linguistics research institutes, Indological and Oriental study institutes.

Also School teaching positions in over 20000 schools in India. are also open for Sanskrit students - these jobs are well suited for people who are not looking for a stressful corporate career.

These apart there are many positions outside India in Germany, France, USA, Japan and Canada are there for Sanskrit linguistics Research and Programmers.

So making our children study Sanskrit not only protects the language and culture but also offers them good career options. As today we are short of quality Sanskrit Teachers everywhere... as well as students!.

To ensure quality and standards - Sanskrit has to be studied through Sanskrit medium alone. In the universities such as Rashtriya Sanskrit Sansthan, Rashtriya Sanskrit Vidyapeetha, Karnataka Sanskrit University, and also in many Sanskrit colleges nowadays Sanskrit is taught in Sanskrit medium itself - this was something that wasn't prevalent in the past.

Sanskrit can be easily studied as a home-schooling subject also, with out much expenses. All learning can be done through Distance Education mode itself.

More over for informal adult education of Sanskrit - Samskrita Bharati has 10 day spoken, 3 level classroom learning curriculum as well as a 4 level correspondence learning curriculum - all instructions are through Sanskrit medium itself. In addition many online learning audio and video files are also available free of cost for Sanskrit learning. Today it is inevitable to learn Sanskrit to know deep about our culture. As we have lost our roots with so much of corruption, distortion and loss due to migrations of Indians with in and outside India - we have slowly drifted away from our scientific culture and are not able to scientifically understand even a simple custom. With Sanskrit it is possible to just look at the meaning of the word itself and inquiry into the meaning and also the Ritu to understand the culture from a physical /material aspect. Further study would reveal culture's benefits for the Self, Social from a Spiritual stand point also. The simple practice of "Pranaagnihotram" before taking food itself has deep material and spiritual benefits - which is not just a prayer.

If you're interested in a deeper aspect of Sanskrit shastra, my earlier post
http://vartula.blogspot.in/2012/02/as-student-entering-into-vast-ocean-of.html
would give some more ideas - for even more details with respect to Sanskrit Computational Linguistics please goto
http://sanskritlinguistics.blogspot.in