Advisory Team
Dr. Ram Karan Sharma
Dr. Ram Karan Sharma is an esteemed international Sanskrit scholar and poet. He has been honored with the highest award by the Prime Minister of India for his lifetime of extraordinary contributions to the field of Sanskrit language and literature. A scholar, author, humanitarian and deeply spiritual being, Dr. Sharma has taught, written, translated and promoted Sanskrit for over 50 years.
Dr. Sharma's Sanskrit studies began at the age of nine, when he went to live in a secluded gurukula devoted to the study of Sanskrit. For five years, he spoke, lived and breathed nothing but Sanskrit. Though the school was very austere, he speaks of this as a golden time in his life when he was awakened to a deep affinity with the Sanskrit language and culture, and its sacred texts.
Dr. Sharma went on to receive his M.A. (Sanskrit and Hindi) from Patna University, in his native Bihar, along with earning Sahityacharya, Vyakarana Shastri and Vedanta Shastri degrees from the Bihar Sanskrit Association. As a Fulbright scholar, he came to the US and earned his PhD. in Sanskrit from the University of California in Berkeley.
Dr. Sharma went on to hold many prestigious positions in government and academic institutions. He has been Special Officer (Sanskrit) and Joint Educational Advisor to the Government of India, Founding Director of the Rashtriya Sanskrit Sansthan, and Vice-Chancellor of Kameshwar Singh Darbhanga University, Darbhanga and Sampurnananda Sanskrit University, Varanasi. Dr. Sharma has also held many visiting professorships at major US universities, including Columbia, University of Chicago, UC Berkeley and University of Pennsylvania.
Dr. Sharma writes in both Sanskrit and English, and the Library of Congress lists 20 books he has written, translated and edited. In the field of Ayurveda, Dr. Sharma is known for his monumental translation of the Charaka Samhita and one of its major commentaries. This 7-volume work was undertaken in partnership with the renowned scholar and Vaidya Bhagwan Dash. Dr. Sharma has also written a short work called Rejuvenative Health Care in Ayurveda, a topic he has researched in depth.
Dr. Sharma is known for his leading role in organizing the First and Fifth World Sanskrit Conferences and is President of the International Association of Sanskrit Studies. He has been honored with every prestigious award in his field: the Sahitya Akademi Award, the Bharatiya Bhasha Parishad Award, the Delhi Sanskrit Academy Award, the Indian Presidential Award, and the Krishna Kanta Handique Memorial Award, presented in 2006 by the Honorable Prime Minister of India.
Though he has been consulted by numerous contemporary Sanskrit scholars and graduate students worldwide, has a resume filled with accomplishments, and is still busy teaching and writing,Dr. Sharma speaks with moving humility and deepest satisfaction of the opportunities he has had to serve the poor in his native village region of Bihar.
