Now, Lucknow University to produce certified ‘purohits’

LUCKNOW : The University of Lucknow will now produce trained ‘purohits’. From the academic session beginning July, students can pursue a six-month ‘purohit course’ having components of ‘karmakand’ (ritual services), computer knowledge and English, an official said on Tuesday.

LUCKNOW: The University of Lucknow will now produce trained ‘purohits’. From the academic session beginning July, students can pursue a six-month ‘purohit course’ having components of ‘karmakand’ (ritual services), computer knowledge and English, an official said on Tuesday.

University officials said the course is aimed at addressing the shortage of purohits who are well versed in ‘karmkand’. “There is a dearth of trained ‘purohits’ both in India and abroad,” an official said.

“There will be no age bar for admissions to this course. Anyone having passed Class 12 is eligible. The course will have two papers; each paper will have 30 hours of teaching,” said NK Pandey, spokesperson, LU. LU has also decided to start a course on Bal Sahitya Lekhan (children’s literature) with inputs of Indian culture, art, psychology so that when children read these books, they have a feel of the Indian culture and its ethos, he added.

Besides, three courses related to cultural aspects of Jainism, Buddhism and Bramhinism are also proposed by the university. There will be separate boards to govern these courses that will be run under the umbrella of Abhinav Gupt Sansthan of LU, said Pandey.

The university also proposed to set up a laboratory by Canon to train students in photography, film editing, special effects, cinematography, etc. A proposal for running these courses is being sent to the department of higher education, he said. Later, these courses will be available online as well. The decisions to run new courses were taken at a meeting chaired by vice-chancellor SP Singh on Tuesday.