Encyclopedia of India–China Cultural Contacts v2.c15.s2.t57: Dr Raghuvira
Encyclopedia of India–China Cultural Contacts v2.c15.s2.t57
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Dr Raghuvira
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Acarya Dr Raghuvira (1902 -1963) was born in Rawalpindi (erstwhile west Punjab now in Pakistan) on December 30, 1902. A staunch nationalist, a great scholar, and a well-known philologist, he is famous for his untiring efforts to unravel and highlight the broad span of Indian history, culture and civilisation at the global level. He was an MA from Punjab University and did his PhD from London and DLitt from Leiden (Holland) universities. Thus well-versed in both modern Western education and Indian classical literature, he started his teaching career at Lahore where he became the Head of the Sanskrit Department in Sanatan Dharma College. He was soon offered the position of the Principal of the College which he refused because it required him to stay away from politics.
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Dr Raghuvira was a great Indian philologist. He was in the forefront of a movement to establish a common Indian language against the imperialist monopoly of English. Having good command over Indian languages like Hindi, Sanskrit, Urdu, Bengali, Marathi, Tamil, Telugu and Punjabi and of foreign languages like Persian, Arabic and Tibetan, he coined some 150,000 scientific and other terms with Sanskrit as the common base just like Latin has been for European languages. His monumental work, the ‘Greater English-Hindi Dictionary’ remains his fundamental contribution to the cause of Indian languages.
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He also produced critical editions of several ancient Sanskrit texts. As one of the editors of Pune’s Bhandarkar Oriental Research Institute’s project on the Mahabharata, he compiled and brought out the fourth book of the Mahabharata, the ‘Virataparvan’. He has more than 30 major publications to his credit.
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One of his great contributions pertains to the studies of cultural ties between India and China in particular, and Southeast Asia in general. He observed Hindu and Buddhist missionaries as cultural colonisers of this vast region. During his visits to different countries, he was able to identify and collect a huge number of relics and manuscripts. He was supported by Pandit Jawaharlal Nehru, Chou En-lai and other contemporary Asian leaders in his work. When he came back from China after a three-month tour in 1956 he carried a baggage of 300 wooden boxes with him containing the rarest of finds, antiques and manuscripts bearing on the deep cultural contacts between China and India.
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*Dr Raghuvira, second from left, together with Chinese scholars*
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These are now stored in his International Academy of Indian Culture (New Delhi), which he had established as a centre of research on Indian culture, literature and religion with particular focus on its widespread impact and proliferation from Mongolia to Indonesia, China, Russia and Central Asia. His Chinese - Sanskrit Lexicon is still very useful. His Academy’s journal entitled ‘Indo-Asian Culture’, is well known in the area of culture studies.
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As a national political leader, Dr Raghuvira was elected first to the Constituent Assembly in 1948 and then to the Rajya Sabha in 1952 and 1957. His contribution to parliamentary and inner party debates with inside knowledge of China and Southeast Asia was unique. Favouring ‘Hindu’ nationalism, he was later disillusioned by China. He also developed differences with the Congress Party and joined the Jana Sangh Party (presently known as Bharatiya Janata Party).
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His life unfortunately ended in May 1963 in a car accident near Kanpur when he was on an election campaign in Uttar Pradesh as Jana Sangh President.
Linked texts (1)
- Mahābhārata — Vyāsa, Sanskrit