Prof. Chita Baral (ASU.edu) Ratnagiri-Lalitagiri-Udayagiri Knowledge Complex revival committee

from Prof. Baral through email.


Dear Pranay:

Hope you will have time between your cricket and hockey watching to read the following. :-)

Last year I came across information regarding Ratnagiri, Lalitagiri and Udayagiri Complex and Puspagiri (all in Odisha) being (part of) an ancient Buddhist university comparable to Nalanda.

While I had read about Nalanda and Taxila in high school, and read about the recent revival of Nalanda University (with efforts led by Nobel Laureate Amartya Sen and President Kalam) I had not heard of Ratnagiri and Puspagiri, even though Ratnagiri is about 70 kms from Cuttack (and 100 kms from Bhubaneswar).

The comparison of Ratnagiri and Puspagiri with Nalanda intrigued me and for the last year or so I started exploring and researching the Buddhist art history and archaeology literature to find out more about Ratnagiri (Lalitagiri and Udayagiri) and Puspagiri and how they compared to Nalanda. In the process I exchanged mails and met with Professor Thomas Donaldson of Cleveland State University who has written several books on Art history and archaeology of Odisha and India. He gave me several pointers. I also met professors at Utkal University who do research on these areas and went with some of them to see Ratnagiri, Lalitagri and Udayagiri.

I am astounded by what I found through my exploration and research. The Buddhist art history literature is replete with references and mentions of comparisons between Ratnagiri and Nalanda. Following are some samples:

0. Professor Thomas Donaldson (in his email):

As you know Ratnagiri was a rival to Nalanda as a site of Buddhist learning and some later Tibetan texts even ascribe the origin of Mahayana and Tantrayana to Ratnagiri. Collectively the three closely situated sites certainly compare artistically to the site of Nalanda ...

1. From the Archaeological Survey of India Brochure made available at the Archaeological Musuem at Ratnagiri:

Extensive excavations conducted at the site by the Archaeological Survey of India between 1958 and 1961 have brought to light remains of a Buddhist establishment consisting of stupas, monastic complexes and temples hitherto unparalleled in Orissa and comparable to the well known Buddhist site at Nalanda.


2. From pages 226-227 of Debala Mitra’s book: Buddhist Monuments (Debala Mitra was the Director General of Archaeological Survey of India between 1975-1983)

Ratnagiri-mahavihara … It played a significant role in disseminating Buddhist culture and religion forming itself, like Nalanda, an important religious and philosophical academy, to which flocked the entrants and scholars to take lessons from the intellectual stalwarts of Buddhism.

… Indeed, excavations have revealed that here was an establishment that can be compared with that of Nalanda. In the overwhelming number of portable monolithic stupas Ratnagiri can compete even with Bodh-Gaya.

3. From page 152 of Debala Mitra’s book: Ratnagiri

Monastery 1 … Not a single monastery of Nalanda, which has yielded so far the largest number of spectacular structural monasteries , can compete with this one in respect of embellishment.

4. Page 114 of Sunita Dwivedi’s “Buddhist heritage sites of India”

Lalitgiri, Udaygiri and Ratnagiri in Cuttack district on the banks of river Birupa are famous as the `golden traingle’ of Orissa. … The triangle is supposed to have been the famous Puspagiri monastic complex mentioned by Hiuen Tsang. It was considered as an important seat of Buddhist learning, next only to Taxila and Nalanda.

5. Page 143 from “Tourism in India and India's economic development” By Kartik Chandra Roy, Clement Allan Tisdell

The Ratnagiri Vihara like the Puspagiri Vihara was known throughout the Buddhist world as a great center of learning, and a rival to Nalanda.

6. Yojana: Volume 43 India planning commission, India Ministry of Information and Broadcasting

According to archaeologists, a Buddhist University known as Pushpagiri Vihar was located on the hills about 70 kilometers from Cuttack. Since it was as important as Nalanda and Takshila, the Chinese traveller Huen Tsang visited this place.

7. The Maha Bodhi: Volume 95

In about 5th century AD, a Buddhist academy under the title of Puspagiri Vihara came into existence in Ratnagiri. This academy, rather university, was in a very prosperous condition like Nalanda and Vikramashila.


More details and more quotes are in the attached power point slides.

Considering the very low level of awareness about Ratnagiri (Lalitagiri and Udayagiri) among people from Odisha, let alone among Indians and others, I think it is important that we make some serious efforts to increase awareness about this.

But more importantly, Ratnagiri being a contemporary and competitor of Nalanda means that it was one of the early universities of the world. This is of great significance; perhaps as significant or may be even more significant than the Konark temple, Lord Jagannath Temple, and various temples in Bhubaneswar, as those places were (a) places of worship with (b) great architectural as well as artistic value; while Ratnagiri (Lalitagiri and Udayagiri) in addition to having those two attributes also have the added dimension of being one of the early centers of knowledge in the world.

In other words the Ratnagiri, Lalitagiri and Udayagiri complexes, as one among the first (pre) universities in the world, may be the biggest contribution of Odisha to the world and the mankind.

Yet, this is not much known in Odisha, India or the world; outside of Buddhist art history and archaeology research circles.

As ambassadors of Odisha, we ought to make efforts to address this.

I discussed this with Annapurna apa (President of the Orissa Society of America and a faculty in Anthropology teaching at the University of California Santa Cruz) and we both agree that we should make an all out effort to make this known around the world and in the process revive this ancient university.

We would like your help towards that effort. As a start, we would like to invite you to be a member of the Ratnagiri-Lalitagiri-Udayagiri Knowledge Complex revival committee. Our immediate plan is to organize a meeting about this in July 2012 and formulate a steering committee that will lead the efforts to (re)establish a university there perhaps called the Ratnagiri-Puspagiri International University.

We look forward to hearing from you on this.

sincerely,

Chitta