![]() Seal of the University | |
Other names | BHU |
---|---|
Former name | Benares Hindu University |
Motto | IAST: Vidyayā'mr̥tamaśnute |
Motto in English | "Knowledge imparts immortality" |
Type | Public research university |
Established | 4 February 1916 |
Founders | |
Academic affiliations | |
Budget | ₹1,808.75 crore (US$210 million)[1] |
Chancellor | Vacant[2] |
Vice-Chancellor | Sanjay Kumar (acting)[3] |
Visitor | President of India |
Students | 30,698[4] |
Undergraduates | 15,746[4] |
Postgraduates | 7,557[4] |
4,555[4] | |
Location | , India 25°16′04″N 82°59′21″E / 25.2677°N 82.9891°E |
Campus | Urban, 1,370 acres (550 ha) |
Language | Hindi, English |
Anthem | Kulgeet - Madhur Manohar |
Colours | BHU Saffron, BHU Blue, BHU Grey/Silver[5] |
Mascot | Goddess Saraswati |
Website | bhu |
Banaras Hindu University(ⓘ) (BHU), formerly Benares Hindu University,[6] is a collegiate, central, and research university located in Varanasi, Uttar Pradesh, India, and founded in 1916. The university incorporated the Central Hindu College, which had been founded by theosophist and future Indian Home Rule leader Annie Besant in 1898.[7][8] By 1911 Besant was marginalised on the governing board of the College by Madan Mohan Malviya who preferred a more traditional Hinduism with its hereditary caste system[9] to Besant's more theosophical one.[10] Five years later Malaviya established the university with the support of the maharaja of Darbhanga Rameshwar Singh, the maharaja of Benares Prabhu Narayan Singh, and the lawyer Sunder Lal.
With over 30,000 students, and 18,000 residing on campus, BHU is the largest residential university in Asia.[11][12] The university is one of the eight public institutions declared as an Institute of Eminence by the Government of India.[13][14] It is also one of the 12 institutions from India in BRICS Universities League, a consortium of leading research universities from BRICS countries.[15] The university's main campus spread over 1,370 acres (5.5 km2), was built on land donated by Prabhu Narayan Singh, the hereditary ruler of Benares State. The south campus, spread over 2,700 acres (11 km2) is built on land donated later by Aditya Narayan Singh in Sunderpur,[16] hosts the Krishi Vigyan Kendra (Agriculture Science Centre)[17] and is located in Barkachha in Mirzapur district, about 60 km (37 mi) from Varanasi.[18][19]
BHU is organized into six institutes, 14 faculties (streams) and about 140 departments. As of 2020[update], the total student enrolment at the university is 30,698[4][20] coming from 48 countries.[21][22] It has over 65 hostels for resident students. Several of its faculties and institutes include Arts, Social Sciences, Commerce, Management Studies, Science, Performing Arts, Law, Agricultural Science, Medical Science, and Environment and Sustainable Development along with departments of Linguistics, Journalism & Mass Communication, among others.[23] The university's engineering institute was designated as an Indian Institute of Technology in June 2012, and henceforth is Indian Institute of Technology (BHU).[24] Centralised in 1916 through the Banaras Hindu University Act, Banaras Hindu University is India's first central university. BHU celebrated its centenary year in 2015–2016.[25][26]
Kashinath Singh ...did his MA at the Benares Hindu University (BHU) in 1959, and obtained his PhD in 1963, both in Hindi, ... after his retirement as professor of Hindi and head of the Hindi department at Banaras Hindu University in 1997.
While ustads were thus more or less marginalized at Lucknow's Marris College, AIR and Paluskar's schools, they were, as expected expelled entirely from Benares Hindu University (BHU). Formerly known as Central Hindu College, BHU had been a centre for dissemination of Hindu nationalist ideas since its foundation in 1916. The Theosophist Annie Besant, who was actually the President of Indian National Congress in 1917–1918, had established Central Hindu College in 1898, and for a long time it was closely linked with the Theosophical movement. Theosophists generally played an important role in the making of Indian nationalism, especially because they propagated the 'spirituality' of the Hindu (and Buddhist) traditions as superior to Western 'materialistic' civilization.
In Benares, Kawaguchi took up residence in the faculty residence hall at Central Hindu College (later Banares Hindu University) while studying Sanskrit there as well as at the Government Sanskrit College (a.k.a. Benares Sanskrit College; founded in 1791 (p. 84) ... Annie Besant and her Theosophical Society associates founded Central Hindu College in 1898 as part of her broader efforts to build a higher-education system in India that honored Indian traditions. Cultivating the rising tide of nationalism, Besant argued that government-run schools were denigrating Indian language, religion, and literature, turning Indians against their glorious culture. In order to preserve the sanatana Dharma (eternal Dharma, which was understood as "orthodox Hinduism"), Besant garnered the support of many wealthy Indians, including the Maharaja of Benares who augmented the original property holdings with additional land and buildings. At the time of the college's inception, each day began with a Hindu prayer, segregation of students by caste was honored, and religious education in nonsectarian Hinduism as portrayed in the school textbook Sanatana Dharma was emphasized. The founders' concession to modern education was including instruction in science and other subjects that were in tune with the times.(p. 87)
A lawyer by training, Malviya became a member of the Congress upon its inception, and was a professional politician: he was appointed president of Congress in 1909 and in 1918 got himself first elected to the Municipal Council of Allahabad and then to the Provincial Legislative Council without interruption for decades. He constantly defended moderate positions on the British presence in India, as well as conservative views of social reform. He was the archetypal orthodox Brahmin. He would not accept food from people who were not of his own jati. He started the Hindu Samaj (Hindu Society) in 1880 to defend the region's Hindu festivals, in particular the yearly Magh Mela, which he felt was under threat on account of missionaries. Soon afterwards, he launched plans for a Hindu university. This was to become the Benares Hindu University (BHU) in 1916. The idea was to preserve the Hindu tradition, including a hereditary caste system. Soon after the opening of BHU, in 1922 Malaviya was instrumental in reviving the Hindu Mahasabha within the Congress.
Over the course of Kawaguchi's seven years in Benares, particularly as Annie Besant became enmeshed in the founding of the Order of the Rising Sun (later Order of the Star in East), which was centered on Jiddu Krishnamurti as the world messiah, Indian supporters sought to wrest control of the college from the Theosophists, fearing that Hindu education was being infused with a Theosophically tinged version of Christianity. By 1911, Madan Mohan Malaviya (1861–1946) and others promoting Hindu education were putting plans in place to forge a university that would "train teachers of religion for the preservation and promotion of the Sanatan Dharma which is inculcated by the Srutis, Smritis, and Puranas, and recognised by Varna-Ashram. In addition "the University was to be residential, students were to be admitted directly after the upanayan (sacred thread ceremony) and to observed the laws of Brahmacharya throughout their student career. At the time of the college's thirteenth-anniversary celebrations in December 1911, the Theosophists, including Besant, had lost control of the institution they had begun. Their approach to Hindu education, as expressed in Sanatana Dharma, was abandoned for the more orthodox Hinduism of Malaviya and his associates, who now controlled the governance of the school. By 1913, as Central Hindu College merged into the new Benares Hindu University, the Theosophists were left with but a nominal role in the institution's governance. (pp. 87–88)