Matunga temple to honour women Sanskrit scholars Thursday

MUMBAI: Even as the HRD ministry under Smriti Zubin Irani is encouraging Sanskrit as an important language in schools and colleges, a temple in Matunga will honour two women scholars Thursday.
The Sri Sankara Mattham, a temple dedicated to Adi Sankaracharya, will felicitate Dr Uma Chandrasekhar Vaidya and Dr Gauri Mahulikar with the Adi Sankara Puraskar. Both are scholars of Sanskrit and eminent educationists.Vaidya is vice chancellor of Kavikulaguru Kalidas Sanskrit University in Nagpur. She has more than 70 research publications to her credit and is expert in Sanskrit and Pali. She has presented several papers across the world in ayurveda, philosophy, literature and human rights. Mahulikar is head of department of Sanskrit at the Ramakrishna Bajaj Sanskrit Bhavan of Mumbai University. She specialises in Vedanta and Vedic studies and has written more than 50 thesis papers.
The Adi Sankara Puraskar was instituted by the math in the year 2000 in order to recognise outstanding contribution in the field of Vedic studies and Advaita Vedanta propagated by the saint. It carries a cash prize of Rs 1 lakh and citation. This is the first time two women have been selected winners. So far over 20 Sanskrit scholars from various cities have been honoured.
The Sankaracharya of Kanchi, Jayendra Saraswati, who has become a permanent fixture at the events of SIES and Sankara Mattham, will present the awards.
As part of incentivising the study of Sanskrit, this temple conducts the annual Adi Sankara slogan competition for students across India. It has earmarked Rs 1 lakh for this purpose. The mandir conducts Veda classes in Sanskrit and teaches the Bhagwad Gita as well.