98 Notable alumni of Banaras Hindu University

Mahendra Shukla is a former Indian first-class cricketer.

Surgeon Vice Admiral Tapan Sinha, SM is the Director General Medical Services of the Indian Navy and a former Additional Director General Armed Forces Medical Services.

Professor Surendra Nath Pandeya was an Indian medicinal and organic chemist. He made several contributions in the design and discovery of anticonvulsant, antitubercular, anti-HIV, anti-cancer, antibacterial, and antimicrobial molecules. His research focused on semicarbazones, Mannich bases, thiadiazoles, benzothiazoles, and oxindole compounds.

Prabhat C Chandra is an Indian geophysicist. Since 1973, he has done extensive work in the field of hydrogeophysics, encompassing groundwater exploration, development and management with a specialization in groundwater geophysics using various geophysical methods.

Vinodini Tarway was a female Indian academic, born in the heritage city of Gaya, Bihar.

Rabindra Nath Upadhyay was an Indian social worker, Gandhian and the founder of Tamulpur Anchalik Gramdan Sangha (TAGS), a non governmental organization working for the social development of the rural people in the Kumarikata village of Assam. He was a recipient of the 2003 Jamnalal Bajaj Award. The Government of India awarded him the fourth highest civilian award of the...

Ashis K. Mukherjee is an Indian biochemist specializing in snake venom biochemistry, molecular biology and microbiology. He served as the Head of the Department of Molecular Biology and Biotechnology of Tezpur University during 2008– 2011. Known for his research on snake venom biochemistry, proteomic composition and other proteins related work from microbial and plant background, Mukherjee serves as the head...

B. C. Nirmal born 19 February 1952, is an Indian Professor of Law specialised in International law, Human rights. He has 42 years teaching and research experience in law, and has played a role in the overall development of the BHU Law School. He was vice chancellor at National University of Study and Research in Law, Ranchi, Jharkhand. Before that,...

Mandagere Subbarao Krishnamurthy, known by the pen name Indiresh or Ma Su Krishnamurthy, is an Indian Kannada writer and Hindi writer.

Pandit Laxmi Ganesh Tewari is a Hindustani vocalist from India. He is an exponent of the Gwalior gharana (tradition) of vocal music. After studying with Lalmani Misra at Banaras Hindu University in Varanasi, he pursued education and teaching opportunities in America. At Sonoma State University since 1974, his career has combined performance, scholarship and teaching.

Achal Das Bohra was an Indian engineer, academician, author, educator and philanthropist. Bohra, affectionately known as "Papaji" and "Bohra Saab", was a leader of the Pushkarna Brahmin community in Rajasthan and a tireless advocate of women's rights and the balance of modernity and traditional Hindu philosophical thought.

Ram Badan Singh is an Indian agricultural scientist, academic and the chancellor of the Central Agricultural University.

Krishna Chandra Sharma, also known as Bhikkhu, was an Indian radio broadcaster and author. He was the Director General of All India Radio from 1980 to 1981. He was a noted novelist and wrote over twenty literary works in his lifetime.

Bulusu Lakshmana Deekshatulu is an Indian academic who has made important contributions to Digital Image Processing and Control Theory. He is a Fellow of The World Academy of Sciences, Fellow of Indian National Science Academy, The National Academy of Sciences, India, Indian Academy of Sciences, Indian National Academy of Engineering, National Academy of Agricultural Sciences, and IEEE.

Pandit Damodar Hota was an Indian classical vocalist, musicologist, composer, and guru based in Odisha, India. He was an exponent of Hindustani classical music as well as Odissi classical music (Udra Paddhatiya Sangita).

Awadh Kishore Narain was an Indian historian, numismatist and archaeologist, who published and lectured extensively on the subjects related to South and Central Asia. He was well known for his book, The Indo-Greeks, published by Clarendon Press in 1957, in which he discussed the thesis of British historian Sir William Woodthorpe Tarn.

Arvind Mohan Kayastha is an Indian Biologist in the field of plant biochemistry and enzyme technology. He is a Professor at the School of Biotechnology, Banaras Hindu University and was the coordinator of the School of Biotechnology. He is a fellow of National Academy of Sciences, India, National Academy of Agricultural Sciences, and National Academy of Medical Sciences.

Ramachandra Behera is an Odia story writer, novelist, dramatist and lecturer. He received the state sahitya academy award for his novel "Abhinayara Paridhi" in 1993.

Anil Karanjai was an accomplished Indian artist. Born in East Bengal, he was educated in Benaras, where his family settled subsequent to the Partition of the Indian subcontinent in 1947. As a small child he had spent long hours playing with clay to make toys and arrows. He also began very early to draw animals and plants, or whatever inspired...

Satchit Shamsher Jung Bahadur Rana was the 34th Chief of Army Staff of the Royal Nepalese Army. He was a member of the Rana Dynasty of Nepal.

Amod Prasad Upadhyay was a Nepalese social worker and politician.

Ved Kumari Ghai was an Indian Sanskrit scholar from Jammu City, Jammu and Kashmir. She was head of the Sanskrit department in Jammu University.

Ragini Trivedi is an Indian classical musician performing on vichitra veena, sitar and jal tarang. Daughter of the vichitra veena player and musicologist Lalmani Misra, she is an exponent of Misrabani and is the creator of a digital music notation system called Ome Swarlipi.

Godey Murahari in Jamshedpur was former Deputy Speaker of 6th Lok Sabha and Member of Lok Sabha, Parliament of India. He was also member of Rajya Sabha from Uttar Pradesh from 1962 to 1977 and Rajya Sabha Deputy Chairman from 1972 to 1977. He belongs to Perika (Puragiri Kshatriya) caste. He died in 1982.

Anil Srivastava is an Indian politician and district president of the Indian National Congress, Varanasi.His political party is the Indian National Congress.

Pandit Shyam Sunder Surolia was an Indian freedom fighter since 1934. Then a 14-year-old child, he raised his voice against the feudal powers of the state of Rajasthan.

Narayanprasaddasji Swami, also known as Tapomurti Shastri Swami and Guruji by his devotees, was one of the most noted swamis of the Swaminarayan Sampraday. He has been called one of the most legendary Hindu saints of India.

Pandit Raghunath Prasanna was an Indian classical shehnai and flute player. He was known for using the techniques of shehnai in flute playing inspired by vocal music.

Dr. Modadugu Vijay Gupta is an Indian biologist and fisheries scientist. He was awarded the World Food Prize in 2005, for development and dissemination of low-cost techniques for freshwater fish farming (using tilapia species) by the rural poor. He is considered a pioneer in the blue revolution of Southeast Asia. In 2015, was selected for the first Sunhak Peace Prize,...

Anand Mohan is registrar of Dayalbagh Educational Institute, Agra (India) and former professor at Department of Geology, Banaras Hindu University. He is a scientist in the field of geology, petrology and mineralogy. He is a member of XII Five Year Plan (2012–2017) of Planning Commission sub-committee on "Strengthening Community Engagement in Higher Education Institutions". He is also expert reviewer for...

Selina Sharma is an Italian-born Indian musicologist and vocalist. Her theoretical work concentrates on South Asia, in particular on the devotional music tradition of the Vraja region, the Bauls of Bengal as well as on the philosophical and spiritual aspects of music. Currently she is the Vice-Secretary and Academic Director of Vraja Kala Sanskriti Sansthana (Institute of Vraja Art and...

Saket Kushwaha is an Indian educationist and agricultural economist. He is serving as Vice Chancellor (VC) of University of Ladakh and is a former Vice Chancellor of Rajiv Gandhi University, Arunachal Pradesh and Lalit Narayan Mithila University, Bihar. He is a Professor of Agricultural Economics at the Banaras Hindu University, on lien.

Kamal Mani Dixit was the founder and chair of the Madan Puraskar Pustakalaya library and the Madan Puraskar award. He was the author of numerous Nepali books and made important contributions to Nepali literature.

Shri Gauri Shanker Pandey, was a veteran Indian politician and a former Minister of Bihar. He represented Bettiah constituency in Bihar assembly and served in various ministerial portfolios.

Tiruppattur Venkatachalamurti Ramakrishnan FRS is an Indian theoretical physicist renowned for his contributions to condensed matter physics. He served as the DAE Homi Bhabha Chair Professor in the Department of Physics at Banaras Hindu University (BHU) from 2003 to 2008 and has been an Emeritus Professor there since 2006. He is also a Distinguished Associate at the Centre for Condensed...

Nagendra Kumar Singh is an Indian agricultural scientist. He is presently a National Professor Dr. B.P. Pal Chair and JC Bose National Fellow at ICAR-National Institute for Plant Biotechnology, Indian Agricultural Research Institute, New Delhi. He was born in a small village Rajapur in the Mau District of Uttar Pradesh, India. He is known for his research in the area...

Ashok Agarwal is the former Director of the Andrology Center, and also the former Director of Research at the American Center for Reproductive Medicine at Cleveland Clinic, Cleveland, USA. He is a former Professor at the Cleveland Clinic Lerner College of Medicine of Case Western Reserve University, USA. Ashok is a former Senior Staff in the Cleveland Clinic's Glickman Urological...

Litterateur and parliamentarian Shankar Dayal Singh was twice elected to the Parliament of India. He was one of the youngest members of the Fifth Lok Sabha, in which he represented the Chatra parliamentary constituency in Bihar (now in Jharkhand). Contesting his maiden Lok Sabha election in 1971, he defeated Smt. Vijaya Raje, the wife of Sri Kamakhya Narayan Singh, Raja...

Samir Kumar Saha is an eminent Bangladeshi microbiologist and public health expert. He is the professor, senior consultant and head of the department of Diagnostic Division of Microbiology at the Dhaka Shishu Hospital for children and also the executive director of The Child Health Research Foundation (CHRF) at the Bangladesh Institute of Child Health.

Kameshwar C. Wali was an Indian-born American theoretical physicist who was the Distinguished Research Professor of Physics Emeritus at Syracuse University's College of Arts and Sciences. He was a specialist in high energy physics, particularly symmetries and dynamics of elementary particles, and the author of Chandra: A Biography of S. Chandrasekhar and Cremona Violins: a physicist's quest for the secrets...

Tapan Singhel is the Managing Director and Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of Bajaj General Insurance (formerly Bajaj Allianz General Insurance) company since April 2012. He has held leadership positions in various industry bodies, including the General Insurance Council, CII National Committee on Insurance & Pensions, and the Indo-German Chamber of Commerce. In 2023, he was appointed as an Honorary Professor...

Sandeep Das is an Indian tabla player and composer currently based in Boston, Massachusetts, United States.

Pulickel Madhavapanicker Ajayan is the Benjamin M. and Mary Greenwood Anderson Professor in Engineering at Rice University, Houston, Texas. He is a professor in the Materials Science and NanoEngineering Department and also holds joint appointments with the Department of Chemistry and Department of Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering. Prior to joining Rice, he was the Henry Burlage Professor of Material Sciences...

Rewa Prasad Dwivedi was a Sanskrit scholar, poet, writer, teacher, and critic. His original works include poetry as epics and lyrics, plays, and prose. He wrote the new literature under the pseudonym "sanatana", meaning 'the eternal'. He is also known as 'Acharya' Dwivedi ('the scholar' or 'the expert' Dwivedi).

Amitabha Singh is an Indian cinematographer and producer known for the film Khosla Ka Ghosla and the award-winning Chillar Party, among others. The Good Road, a 2013 film he produced, fetched numerous accolades and was screened at various international film festivals. It was selected as India's official entry in the Best Foreign Language Film category at the 86th Academy Awards....

Kedar Pandey was an Indian independence activist and Indian National Congress politician who served as the Chief Minister of Bihar from March 1972 to 2 July 1973 and Minister of Railways in the Union Cabinet from 12 November 1980 to 14 January 1982 in the Government of India.

Kalu Lal Shrimali was an Indian parliamentarian, educationist, and author, who served as the 2nd Union Minister of Education for Government of India.

Prahalad Chunnilal Vaidya, was an Indian physicist and mathematician, renowned for his instrumental work in the general theory of relativity. Apart from his scientific career, he was also an educationist and a follower of Gandhian philosophy in post-independence India, specifically in his domicile state Gujarat.

Sarat Chandra Sinha was an Indian politician and Chief Minister of Assam. He was a leader of Indian National Congress, Indian National Congress (Socialist) and Nationalist Congress Party.

Vishwanath Tripathi is a Hindi writer. He has around 20 publications to his credit which include literary criticism, memoirs and poetry collection.

Radha Burnier was born in Adyar, India. She was president of the Theosophical Society Adyar from 1980 until her death in 2013. She was General Secretary of the Indian Section of the Society between 1960 and 1978, and was previously an actress in Indian films and Jean Renoir's The River.

Colin Macmillan Turnbull was a British-American anthropologist who came to public attention with the popular books The Forest People (on the Mbuti Pygmies of Zaire) and The Mountain People (on the Ik people of Uganda), and one of the most significant influences on the postwar development of ethnomusicology.

Kuber Nath Rai, also written as Kubernath Ray and Kuber Nath Ray, was a writer and scholar of Hindi literature and Sanskrit.

Kapila Vatsyayan was a leading scholar of Indian classical dance, art, architecture, and art history. She served as a member of parliament and bureaucrat in India, and also served as the founding director of the Indira Gandhi National Centre for the Arts.

Dev Kant Barooah was an Indian politician from Assam, who served as the 83rd President of the Indian National Congress during the Emergency from 1975 to 1978 and the seventh Governor of Bihar from 1971 to 1973. He also served as union cabinet minister for Ministry of Petroleum and Natural Gas in Second Indira Gandhi ministry from 5 February 1973...

Satya Vrat Shastri was an Indian Sanskrit scholar, writer, grammarian and poet. He wrote three Mahakavyas, three Khandakavyas, one Prabandhakavyas and one Patrakavya and five works in critical writing in Sanskrit. His important works are Ramakirtimahakavyam, Brahattaram Bharatam, Sribodhisattvacharitam, Vaidika Vyakarana, Sarmanyadesah Sutram Vibhati, and "Discovery of Sanskrit Treasures" in seven volumes.

Bhupendra Man Sherchan, popularly known as Bhupi Sherchan was a Nepali poet and academician. He is one of the most beloved and widely read Nepali poets. He was awarded the Sajha Puraskar for his 1969 poetry collection Ghumne Mech Mathi Andho Manche, which remains his most popular work.

Shyama Charan Shukla was an Indian National Congress politician and thrice Chief Minister of Madhya Pradesh.

Kodipakam Neelameghacharya Govindacharya is a founder Bharat Vikas Sangam, Kautilya International Foundation, Kautilya Shodh Sansthan, Rastriya Swabhiman Andolan and Forum for Ecocentric Development (Prakriti Kendrit Vikas Manch) Formally Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh pracharak, environmental activist, social activist, political activist and thinker. He was associated with Bharatiya Janata Party but is now a staunch critic of that party as much as he...

Sandeep Pandey is an Indian social activist and the present General Secretary of the Socialist Party (India). He co-founded Asha for Education with Dr. Deepak Gupta (presently Professor at IIT Kanpur) and V.J.P Srivastava while working on his Ph.D. in Mechanical Engineering at the University of California, Berkeley. He has taught as a visiting professor at Indian Institute of Management...

Kashinath Singh is an Indian writer and scholar of Hindi language and known for writing novels and short stories in Hindi. He was formerly a professor of Hindi literature in Banaras Hindu University. He received the Sahitya Akademi Award in 2011 for his novel Rehan Par Ragghu, and is considered one of the best chroniclers of the city of Varanasi....

Man Mohan Adhikari was the 31st Prime Minister of Nepal from 1994 to 1995, representing the Communist Party of Nepal (Unified Marxist-Leninist). He was the first communist Prime Minister in Nepal and one of the first communist politicians in the world to be democratically elected as a head of government.

Gurmukh Nihal Singh was the first Governor of Rajasthan and second Chief Minister of Delhi from 1955 to 1956 and was a Congress leader. He was the successor of Brahm Prakash and assumed office in 1955 just for one year. The noted journalist and editor of The Statesman, Surendra Nihal Singh (1929-2018) was Gurmukh Nihal Singh's son.

Vibhuti Narayan Singh was the king of Benares, a city considered holy, located in the present-day Indian state of Uttar Pradesh. He was the last Bhumihar king of the Kingdom of Kashi as after his reign Princely states were abolished. Vibhuti Narayan Singh was a godly figure in Varanasi and he is still remembered as "Guardian of Kashi ".

Dr. Vina Mazumdar was an Indian academic, left-wing activist and feminist. A pioneer in women's studies in India, she was a leading figure of the Indian women's movement. She was amongst the first women academics to combine activism with scholarly research in women's studies. She was secretary of the first Committee on the Status of Women in India that brought...

Namvar Singh was an Indian literary critic, linguist, academician and theoretician. He received his doctorate degree from Banaras Hindu University where he also taught for some time. He served as a professor of Hindi literature in several other universities. He was the founder and first chairman of Jawaharlal Nehru University's Centre of Indian Languages and continued to remain as a...

Janaki Ballabh Patnaik was an Indian politician who had been 25th Governor of Assam from 2009 to 2014. A leader of the Indian National Congress, he was Chief Minister of Odisha from 1980 to 1989 and again from 1995 to 1999, holding that post for the longest time on record before Naveen Patnaik. In 1950, he became the President of...

Lalji Singh was an Indian scientist who worked in the field of DNA fingerprinting technology in India and pioneer of Assisted reproductive technology, where he was popularly known as the "Father of Indian DNA fingerprinting". Singh also worked in the areas of molecular basis of sex determination, wildlife conservation forensics and evolution and migration of humans. In 2004, he received...

Surya Pratap Shahi is an Indian politician. He is a Member of 9th, 11th, 13th, 17th Legislative Assembly of Uttar Pradesh and 18th Uttar Pradesh Assembly. Currently he is serving as Cabinet Minister in Uttar Pradesh Government with the portfolio of Agriculture, Agriculture Education and Agriculture Research. He has worked as the president of Uttar Pradesh state unit in the...

Harivansh Narayan Singh is an Indian journalist and politician serving as 13th Deputy Chairperson of the Rajya Sabha, the upper house of the Indian Parliament. He is an MP in the Rajya Sabha representing the state of Bihar.

Raj Narain was an Indian freedom fighter and politician. He won in a famous electoral malpractice case against the then Prime Minister Indira Gandhi, which led to her disqualification and, eventually, imposition of the 21-month Emergency in India from 1975. He defeated Gandhi during the 1977 Lok Sabha elections.

Mahendra Nath Pandey is an Indian politician who was Minister of Heavy Industries and Minister for Skill Development and Entrepreneurship of India and Member of Lok Sabha for Chandauli from 2014 to 2024. He is a member of Bharatiya Janata Party and was the president of the party's Uttar Pradesh unit. He was also Union Minister of State for Ministry...

Vinod Kumar Bansal or VK Bansal was an Indian educationist and the founder of the Bansal Classes in Kota, Rajasthan. He made Kota famous throughout India for IIT-JEE entrance exam preparation.

Om Prakash Rawat is a retired 1977 batch Indian Administrative Service (IAS) officer of the Madhya Pradesh cadre who served as 22nd Chief Election Commissioner of India. He has also served as one of the two Election Commissioners of India and the Public Enterprise Secretary of India.

Bishweshwar Prasad Koirala, better known as B. P. Koirala (Nepali: बीपी कोइराला), was a Nepali revolutionary, political leader, and writer. He was the Prime Minister of Nepal from 1959 to 1960. He led the Nepali Congress, a social democratic political party. He was the grandfather of Bollywood actors Manisha Koirala and Siddharth Koirala, the elder brother of former prime minister...

Robert Maynard Pirsig was an American writer and philosopher. He is the author of the philosophical books Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance: An Inquiry into Values (1974) and Lila: An Inquiry into Morals (1991), and he co-authored On Quality: An Inquiry Into Excellence: Selected and Unpublished Writings (2022) along with his wife and editor, Wendy Pirsig.

Chintamani Nagesa Ramachandra Rao is an Indian chemist who has worked mainly in solid-state and structural chemistry. He has honorary doctorates from 86 universities from around the world and has authored around 1,800 research publications and 58 books. He is described as a scientist who had won all possible awards in his field except the Nobel Prize.

Jayant Vishnu Narlikar FNA, FASc, FTWAS was an Indian astrophysicist who performed research on alternative cosmology. He was also an author who wrote textbooks on cosmology, popular science books, and science fiction novels and short stories.

Shitala Pandey, better known as Sameer or Sameer Anjaan, is an Indian lyricist, known for writing songs predominantly for Bollywood films. He is a Guinness World Record holder for writing the most songs. He has won three Filmfare Awards.

Manoj Kumar Tiwari is an Indian politician, singer and actor. He is serving as a Member of Parliament from North East Delhi since 2014. Tiwari contested the 2009 general election as a Samajwadi Party candidate from Gorakhpur Lok Sabha but lost to Yogi Adityanath. In 2014, he joined Bharatiya Janata Party and contested in 2014 Indian general elections and won....

Madhav Sadashivrao Golwalkar was an Indian politician who served as the second Sarsanghchalak ("Chief") of the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS), a right-wing Hindutva paramilitary organisation. Golwalkar is considered one of the most influential and prominent figures among the RSS by his followers. He was the first person to put forward the concept of the Hindu Rashtra (Hindu Nation) theocratic state,...

Bhupen Hazarika BR, widely known as Sudha Kantha, was an Indian singer, songwriter, writer, filmmaker and politician from Assam. He wrote songs mainly in the Assamese language, which are marked by humanity and universal brotherhood. His songs have been translated into many languages, most notably in Bengali and Hindi.

Anil Bhardwaj is an Indian astrophysicist. He is the director of the Physical Research Laboratory (PRL), which is a unit of the Department of Space of Government of India in Ahmedabad, India.

Krishan Kant was an Indian politician who served as the vice president of India from 1997 until his death in 2002. Prior to his vice presidency, Kant was the governor of Andhra Pradesh from 1990 to 1997. He was a member of both houses of the Indian Parliament, representing Chandigarh in the Lok Sabha from 1977 to 1980, and Haryana...

Deepak Prabhu Ahuja is an Indian-American executive working in the life sciences industry who previously worked in the automotive manufacturing industry. He is best known for serving as the chief financial officer of Tesla for eleven years.

Sahu Ramesh Chandra Jain was a leading mediaperson, philanthropist, promoter of Indian literature, and a prominent member of the Jain religion. He was a descendant of the well-known Sahu Jain family of Najibabad (Bijnor District, Uttar Pradesh).

Nikesh Arora is an Indian-American billionaire business executive. He has been the chairman and chief executive officer of the American cybersecurity company Palo Alto Networks since June 2018. Arora was formerly a senior executive at Google and president of SoftBank Group from October 2014 to June 2016. According to the Bloomberg Billionaires Index, his net worth was estimated at $1.5...

Manoj Sinha is an Indian politician serving as the 2nd and the current lieutenant governor of Jammu and Kashmir. He served as the minister of state for Communications (independent charge) and minister of state for Railways in the government of India. Sinha was elected to the Lok Sabha, representing Ghazipur parliamentary constituency for three terms from the Bharatiya Janata Party....

Lal Mani Joshi was a Buddhist scholar and professor of comparative religions and Buddhist studies in a number of distinguished universities of India and USA.

Sonam Topgyal was Prime Minister (officially Kalön Tripa) of the Central Tibetan Administration (Tibetan government-in-exile). He held the position from 1996 to 2001.

Sri Niwas was an Indian geophysicist and a professor at the Department of Earth Sciences of the Indian Institute of Technology, Roorkee. He was known for his researches on the Inversion of Geophysical Data. He was an elected fellow of all the three major Indian science academies viz. Indian National Science Academy, Indian Academy of Sciences, National Academy of Sciences,...

Mannu Bhandari was an Indian author, screenplay writer, teacher, and playwright. Primarily known for her two Hindi novels, Aap Ka Bunty (Your Bunty) and Mahabhoj (Feast), Bhandari also wrote over 150 short stories, several other novels, screenplays for television and film, and adaptations for theatre. She was a pioneer of the Nayi Kahani movement in Hindi literature, which focused on...

Jagjivan Ram, popularly known as Babuji, was an Indian independence activist and politician who served as a minister with various portfolios for over 30 years, making him the longest-serving Union Cabinet minister in Indian history. He also served as the Deputy Prime Minister of India from January to July 1979. He played a pivotal role as the Defence Minister of...

Kamanio Chattopadhyay is an Indian materials engineer and an honorary professor at the Indian Institute of Science, Bengaluru. He is the chair of the Mechanical Sciences Division of IISc and a former chair of the Department of Materials Engineering.

Raimon Panikkar Alemany, also known as Raimundo Panikkar and Raymond Panikkar, was a Spanish Catholic priest and a proponent of interfaith dialogue. As a scholar, he specialized in comparative religion.

Chantal Maillard is a contemporary Belgo-Spanish poet and philosopher.

Ram Manohar Lohia was an Indian political activist of the Indian independence movement and a socialist politician. As a nationalist, he worked actively to protest against colonialism, raising awareness of the same. He founded multiple socialist political parties and later won elections to the Lok Sabha.