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Kamaleswar Batthacharya

Portrait of Kamaleswar   Batthacharya

Kamaleswar Bhattacharya (29 Aug 1928, near Dhaka [now Bangladesh] — 16 March 2014, Dhaka) was a French Indianist and Sanskritist of Indian origin, a specialist in Ancient Cambodia epigraphy and history.

Educated in Calcutta [Kolkata] and at the Sanskrit University of Varanasi, he came to Paris in September 1955 to help French Sanskritists in bettering their translations of Sanskrit texts, checking and correcting the editions of Sanskrit inscriptions from Cambodia by Auguste Barth, Abel Bergaigne, Louis Finot and George Coedès. Settling in France, he studied under philologist Louis Renou from 1956 to 1966, entered the CNRS (National Center for Scientific Research in Paris) in 1960 — until his retirement in 1996 -, and obtained his doctorate of letters in 1962.

Later on, K. Battacharya critized the French epigraphists — in particular Coedès, who had sat in his doctoral thesis jury in 1962, and Finot, whose interpretation of the meter used in the Sdok Kak Thom inscription he found ​“absurd” — for their ​“lack of adequate knowledge of the Sanskrit language and of the Sanskrit culture that expresses itself in the inscriptions in poetical form.” 

His interest in Indian philology and philosophy led him to explore the Pali Canon and Sanskrit sources on Buddhism, especially regarding Cambodia, with the publication of The Ātman-Brahman in Ancient Buddhism (1973), and later on he explored late Buddhist philosophy and epistemology, commenting the Madhyamakavatara of Chandkrakirti, translating and annotating the Vigrahavyāvartanī, and looking for the influence of Sanskrit grammar on Nāgārjuna’s philosophy and the Tattvacintāmaṇiprabhā (Anumānakhaṇḍa) of the Yajñapati Upādhyāya. 

K. Battacharya taught at various universities and was a visiting professor at Brown University (1967−1969), the University of Toronto (1977−1979), Viśva-Bhāratī University, Santiniketan (1980), and Adyar Library and Research Center, Madras (1994−1995). After his retirement he was a Mercator-Gast professor at the University of Bonn, Germany.

Publications

  1. “The Astamurti Concept of Siva in India, Indo-China and Indonesia”, Indian Historical Quarterly (IHQ) XXIX 3, Sept 1953, p 233 – 241.
  2. “The Pancaratra Sect in Ancient Cambodia”, Journal of Greater India Society (JGIS) XIV 2, 1955, p 111 – 116.
  3. “La secte des Pasupata dans l’ancien Cambodge”, Journal Asiatique (JA), 1955, p 479 – 490. 
  4. “Étude sur l’iconographie de Bantay Samrè”, Arts asialiques (AA) II 4, 1955, p 294 – 308.
  5. “Notes d’iconographie khmère I‑IV”, AA III 3, 1956, p 183 – 194.
  6. “Notes d’iconographie khmère V‑VII”, AA IV 3, 1957, p 208 – 220.
  7. “Notes d’iconographie khmère VIII”, AA IV 4, 1957, p 293 – 298.
  8. “Notes d’iconographie khmère IX‑X”, AA V 3, 1958, p 217 – 220.
  9. “An Unpublished Ganesa Image from Cambodia”, Artibus Asiae (A.As.) XXI 3/4„1958, p 269 – 270.
  10. Les religions brahmaniques dans l’ancien Cambodge [Brahmanic religions in ancient Cambodia, according to Epigraphy and Iconography], Paris, PEFEO XLIX, 1961.
  11. [tr.] Rabindranath Tagore, Le Vagabond et autres histoires, Paris, Gallimard, 1962; repub. [tr. with Christine Boissenec] Paris, Gallimard, 2002.
  12. Contribution to Artibus Asiae: Felicitation Volume Presented to Professor George Coedes on the Occasion of His Seventy-Fifth Birthday, Vol. XXIV, 3⁄4, 1961 [eds. Charles Archaimbault, Au Chhieng, Louis Bezacier, Jean Boisselier]. 
  13. “Hari Kambujendra”, Artibus Asiae, Vol. 27- 1⁄2, 1964, pp. 72−75+77−78.
  14. “Notes sur le Sivapada”, JA 10, 1964.
  15. “Unpublished Temples of Rājasthān”, Arts Asiatiques 11⁄2, EFEO-Musee Guimet, 1965.
  16. “Sur une stance d’une inscription sanskrite du Cambodge”, JA, 1965, p 407 – 9.
  17. “Supplément aux recherches sur le vocabulaire des inscriptions sanskrites du Cambodge I”, Bulletin de l’École française d’Extrême-Orient (BEFEO) 53 – 1, 1966, p 273 – 277.
  18. “Supplément aux recherches sur le vocabulaire des inscriptions sanskrites du Cambodge II”, BEFEO 55, 1969, p 145 – 151.
  19. “Note sur le Vedanta dans l’inscription de Prè Rup (Cambodge)”, JA 99 – 101, 1971.
  20. L’Ātman-brahman dans le bouddhisme ancien, Paris, PEFEO, 1973; repub. Canon Publications, 20125, ISBN10 0881810061.
  21. “The Present State of Researches on the Sanskrit Epigraphy of Cambodia”, in Amrtadhara (R.N. Dandekar Felicitation Volume), Delhi, 1984, p 482 – 484.
  22. The Dialectical Method of Nagarjuna’s Vigrahavyavartani, Delhi, Motilal Banarsidass, 1986.
  23. Researches on the Vocabulary of Sanskrit Inscriptions of Cambodia, Paris, PEFEO 167, 1991.
  24. “L’état actuel des travaux sur les inscriptions sanskrites du Cambodge”, JA, 1997, p 301 – 309.
  25. Some thoughts on early Buddhism: With special reference to its relation to the Upanisads, Delhi, Bhandarkar Oriental Research Institute, 1998.
  26. “The Present State of Work on the Sanskrit Epigraphy of Cambodia”, Udaya 05, 2004, p 213 – 7.
  27. A Selection of Sanskrit Inscriptions from Cambodia, Phnom Penh, Center for Khmer Studies, 2009, ISBN10 9995051079.

Photo-portrait from Tasdra Foundation.

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