The conference linked with the International Hindi day (Hindi Divas) “Hindi from East to West’ was held in the Institute of Oriental Studies, RAU, on the 13th of September.

 

The conference drew leading scientists from India, Russia and Ar-menia to discuss the role Hindi plays in the modern world, its influence on a range of cultures, and the impact of Indian cinematography on the popularisation of Hindi, among others.

 
Director of the Institute of Oriental Studies of RAU Professor Garnik Asatryan, Vice-rector of International Cooperation of RAU Sergey Kapinos and Professor Mukesh Kumar Mishna from the University of Karma Devi Smriti commenced the event: 

"We are glad to greet our guests who are consistently working on the teaching methods of Hindi and its expansion. The conference did not commence today - a two-day touring foreshadowed the event, with its participants having visited the Armenian famous landmarks: Garni, Geghard, and Khor Virap. Everyone is elated at our country’s beauty.
We hope this conference will become a touchstone for regular meetings within a framework of conferences on the popularisation of Hindi. It is of particular im-portance for us, since Indian studies in Armenia have never been a conventional branch of Asian Studies as opposed to Iranian studies, Turkic studies or Arab stud-ies. We are at the start of a journey, and the popularisation of Indian studies as a scientific branch, as well as the Hindi language and Indian culture, being one of the most ancient and richest cultures that had a significant influence on neighbour-ing cultures, is one of the main goals of the Institute. We hope our guests will come back to us once again to proceed with the important issue", -  noted Professor of the Institute of Oriental Studies Victoria Arakelova. 

She also highlighted that a key part in setting up the conference was played by Doctor Arora Kumari Santosh, who has spent many years teaching Hindi and popularising Indian culture. 

During the event, participants also discussed the history of teaching the Indo-Aryan languages in Russia, phrasal parallels in Hindi and Armenian and many others.

It has to be noted that the conference was organised by RAU and University of Karma Devi, Basti.
 

 

Translated by Maria Ivanova,

Master’s Degree Exchange Programme in Transla-tion and Interpretation