Indian Ambassador to Vietnam Parvathaneni Harish on Wednesday afternoon granted a check of US$3,100 to the Ho Chi Minh City University of Social Sciences and Humanities for printing 100 copies of a Hindi-Vietnamese dictionary.

The awarding took place at the 2016 Hindi Day celebration held at the university in cooperation with the Consulate General of India.

The dictionary is the first-ever Hindi-Vietnamese dictionary in Vietnam and was produced first in 2013 under an agreement between the Indian Consulate General in Ho Chi Minh City and the university.

The Ho Chi Minh City University of Social Sciences and Humanities established its Indian Studies major in 2000.

Since then, Hindi, India’s official language, has been available as an undergraduate course, alongside Indian history, politics, economy, culture, society, and foreign policy.

Apart from the publication of the first-ever Hindi-Vietnamese dictionary, the school’s Indian Studies department has undertaken various academic works, including translation of the book “India and Southeast Asia: Towards Security Convergence,” organizing a conference on links between Hinduism and Buddhism in December 2014, and hosting a seminar on Indian values in Asia in December 2015. 

Many of its faculty members have studied in India under scholarships from the Indian government.

At the 2016 Hindi Day, Ambassador Harish congratulated the school’s students on their progress in learning Hindi.

Meanwhile, Indian Consul General Smita Pant thanked the university for creating awareness of Indian culture and undertaking several initiatives for strengthening cultural and academic cooperation.

During the event, a memorandum of understanding on the establishment of the Indian Council for Cultural Relations (ICCR) Chair of Indian Studies at the school was also renewed by Ambassador Harish and the university’s rector Vo Van Sen. 

The MOU calls for an Indian professor to be deputed to teach courses relating to contemporary Indian studies, humanities, social sciences, and more at the university’s Indian Studies Faculty for two years, from 2017 to 2019.

The ICCR Chair of Indian Studies was established at the school in 2011.