Prime Highlights
- Central Sanskrit University launched India’s first AICTE-approved BTech in AI and Data Science at its Nashik campus, with admissions open for 2026-27
- Prime Minister Modi highlighted the programme on Mann Ki Baat, calling it a model for combining future-ready skills with cultural roots
Key Facts
- The course focuses on building AI tools for Indian languages and digitising ancient manuscripts
- It is the first engineering programme of this kind introduced by a Sanskrit university in India
Background
Central Sanskrit University has launched a BTech programme in Artificial Intelligence and Data Science at its Nashik campus, becoming the first Sanskrit university in India to offer an AICTE-approved engineering degree of this kind. Admissions for the 2026-27 academic session are already underway.
The programme brings together two worlds that rarely meet. Students will gain hands-on training in modern AI and data science while working on projects tied to India’s classical knowledge systems.
The university designed the course with a clear purpose to build AI tools for Indian languages and push forward the digitisation and preservation of ancient texts and manuscripts that remain inaccessible to most people today.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi brought national attention to the initiative during his Mann Ki Baat address. He said the programme reflects exactly the kind of thinking India needs right now, young people picking up skills that the future demands while staying grounded in the country’s deep cultural and linguistic roots.
The university sees the programme as more than a technical degree. It frames the course as a research track where students contribute directly to preserving India’s knowledge heritage through technology.
Work on digitising manuscripts, building language models for Sanskrit and other Indian languages, and creating tools that make classical texts searchable and usable forms the core of that vision.
With AICTE backing and admissions already open, the Nashik campus moves quickly from announcement to action.
