The Discover India Podcast by Professor Pankaj Jain: Bhārat Darśan

Is there a surprising connection between Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein and the Hindu myth of Bhasmasura? Both stories warn about the dangers of power without responsibility. This short explores a fascinating comparison between Western literature and Indian mythology.Through this lens, we see how ancient wisdom and modern science fiction sometimes share the same moral insight.#Frankenstein#MaryShelley#HinduMythology#IndianMythology#Bhasmasura#MythologyExplained#AncientWisdom#ScienceAndMyth#DiscoverIndia#MythologyShorts

Mahāvīra Biography Series | Dr. Pankaj Jain The Mahāvīra Biography Series explores the life, philosophy, and civilisational impact of Bhagavān Mahāvīra, the 24th Tīrthaṅkara of the Jain tradition and one of the greatest spiritual revolutionaries of India. Through research-grounded storytelling and historical depth, this documentary series situates Mahāvīra within the broader framework of Dharma — a living civilisational ethos shaping ethics, pluralism, and spiritual traditions across India for over 2,500 years. In Episode 8, we explore:• The historical origins of the Digambara–Śvetāmbara division • Differences in monastic practices and interpretations of renunciation • Debates over scripture, canon, and authenticity • The role of geography, migration, and councils in shaping sectarian identities • Philosophical continuities despite institutional divergenceThis episode reveals how the division within Jain Dharma was not merely a split, but a complex historical process shaped by memory, migration, and interpretation. While Digambara and Śvetāmbara traditions developed distinct practices and textual traditions, both continued to uphold the core teachings of Mahāvīra — Ahimsa, Aparigraha, and the pursuit of liberation. By examining this divergence with nuance and scholarly clarity, Episode 8 highlights how plurality itself has been an enduring feature of Dharma traditions in India.About the Presenter: Dr. Pankaj Jain is Director of The India Centre and Professor & Head of Humanities & Languages at FLAME University. Author of Jainism: From Bhagwan Mahavira to Mahatma Gandhi (2025), he is a Fulbright-Nehru Fellow and internationally recognised scholar of Dharma traditions, sustainability, and Indian intellectual history.Subscribe to continue the Mahāvīra Biography Series as we explore the evolution, diversity, and intellectual richness of Jain Dharma.#DigambaraSvetambara #JainSects #Jainism #JainHistory #Digambara #Svetambara #JainDharma #IndianPhilosophy

Earth Day, April 22, 2026, invites us to rethink how we relate to nature. Western Deep Ecology argues that all life has equal value and that wilderness must be protected. But is that enough? In many Indian traditions, nature is not separate from human life—it is sacred. Communities like the Bishnois and sacred grove traditions have protected ecosystems for centuries through dharma, everyday ethics, and lived practices.This short video explores why Dharmic Ecology offers a powerful alternative—one that integrates spirituality, community, and sustainability.#Earthday #Sustainability #DharmicEcology #DeepEcology #Environment #India #ClimateJustice

Why is there a Shiva Nataraja statue at CERN? This short explains the connection between Sanatana Dharma and modern particle physics at the world’s largest scientific laboratory. Discover how the cosmic dance of Shiva symbolises the dynamic universe studied at CERN’s Large Hadron Collider.#CERN #Shiva #Nataraja #SanatanaDharma #QuantumPhysics #IndianPhilosophy #ScienceAndSpirituality #Hinduism #CosmicDance #DiscoverIndia

Late-Victorian and modernist writers have been famously preoccupied with ideas of personal and poetic discipline (or the lack thereof). How are such notions of askesis articulated within the global contexts of the twentieth century? This talk examines how two prominent twentieth-century writers—Sri Aurobindo and Rabindranath Tagore—engage with askesis in their works. Both writers were deeply fascinated by asceticism and by the figure of the ascetic. I argue that they used literary form as a space to reflect on and experiment with askesis as both figure and method. For Aurobindo, blank verse becomes a formal reflection not only of heterodox ascetic practice but also of a strategic orientation toward a transhistorical and transcultural vision of future poetry and society. For Tagore, the figure of the ascetic functions as an aesthetic cipher against which nascent political ideas and imaginaries may be tested. Drawing on Aurobindo’s The Future Poetry (1917-1920) and Tagore’s “The Ghat’s Story” (1884), Rajarshi (1887), Achalayatan (1912), and Sanyasi (1917), this talk illuminates the centrality of askesis to global twentieth-century critical thought on the theo-politics of literary form. Bio: Dr. Apala Das is an Assistant Professor of English at Bilkent University, Ankara, Turkey. She received her PhD in English from the University of Toronto in 2024. Her current book project, titled In the Shadows of Discipline: Literatures of Renunciation in the Global Twentieth Century, examines selected global literary experiments of the twentieth century as instances of modernist asceticism, conceptualized as critical and creative responses to the ideological and biopolitical forces latent in asceticism. Her work has appeared or is forthcoming in The Wallace Stevens Journal, the Journal of Postcolonial Writing, Modern Fiction Studies, Religion and Literature, and the Bloomsbury Philosophy Library’s Aesthetics and Politics in the Global South.