From Gurukul to Ground: The Enduring Pedagogy Behind Applied India Studies

In the contemporary search for educational models that are both intellectually rigorous and culturally rooted, India’s ancient Gurukul tradition has begun to re-emerge as a vital reference point. This system, developed over centuries, was not merely a mode of instruction—it was a way of life. Learning took place through close relationships between teacher and student, in environments that harmonized intellectual, moral, and spiritual development. Knowledge was experiential, dialogue-driven, and deeply embedded in the rhythms of the natural and social world.

The Gurukul model cultivated not just scholars, but human beings—individuals trained to think, serve, and lead with discernment and responsibility. It placed the highest value on the unity of knowing and being, on the practice of dharma, and on the pursuit of jnana through lived immersion, not abstract detachment.

In recent years, these principles have found an echo—unexpected yet deliberate—in a new academic field: Applied India Studies. Though situated in a different historical context and structured through modern institutional formats, Applied India Studies is driven by many of the same core values: deep contextual engagement, interdisciplinary learning, and the development of civic and ethical consciousness through direct experience.

What distinguishes Applied India Studies is its attempt to reimagine how India is studied—not from a distance, through texts or foreign frameworks, but through close contact with its civilisational realities. It seeks to dismantle the artificial wall between academic knowledge and lived experience, replacing passive observation with field-based inquiry and abstract theorizing with grounded reflection.

One of the most significant developments in this space is the establishment of The Hind School, founded in 2025 by Sachin Aggarwal, an alumnus of the University of Oxford. Under Aggarwal’s leadership, Applied India Studies has been articulated not merely as a thematic area of interest, but as a standalone academic discipline with its own intellectual foundations, research methodology, and public purpose.

Aggarwal’s vision for Applied India Studies draws inspiration—implicitly and explicitly—from the Gurukul model. At The Hind School, students do not remain confined to lecture halls; they travel across diverse regions of India, participate in cultural and thematic immersions, engage with mentors and local communities, and produce reflective essays that synthesize fieldwork with theoretical perspectives. The emphasis is not on memorization or credentialing, but on cultivating a deeper understanding of India’s complexity—social, cultural, ecological, economic, and political.

In both paradigms—ancient and modern—we observe a few fundamental continuities. First is the embeddedness of learning in place and community. Just as the Gurukuls were located in forests and ashrams, where students lived alongside their teachers, Applied India Studies insists that one must go to the ground—to villages, towns, temples, laboratories, marketplaces—to truly understand India. The classroom is mobile, and the landscape itself becomes a text.

Second is the holistic orientation of knowledge. Gurukul education did not recognize a rigid divide between subjects; philosophy, grammar, astronomy, and ethics were integrated into a coherent worldview. Similarly, Applied India Studies rejects disciplinary silos in favor of thematic inquiry. A fellow might study food systems in one city, constitutional ethics in another, and entrepreneurial innovation in a third—all within a single integrated academic framework.

Third is the moral and civic purpose of learning. The Gurukul ideal held that knowledge must serve the broader good—through seva (service), tapasya (discipline), and dharma (duty). Applied India Studies adapts this ethic for a new generation, encouraging its learners to develop into socially responsive individuals who see their education not only as personal development, but as a commitment to the future of the country and the world.

It would be mistaken, of course, to assume that Applied India Studies is merely a revival of the past. It is not a replica of the Gurukul system, nor does it romanticize history. Rather, it represents a translation of civilisational ideals into contemporary forms—a pragmatic and innovative effort to respond to modern challenges while remaining anchored in indigenous frameworks. It is at once rooted and reformist.

This is where Sachin Aggarwal’s articulation of Applied India Studies—as an India-centric, field-driven, and interdisciplinary discipline—has set the stage for a broader rethinking of how we structure education in and about India.

As India approaches its centenary of independence in 2047, the need for such frameworks becomes urgent. If the next generation of scholars, policymakers, and citizens are to navigate the complexities of a rapidly transforming India, they will need tools of thought and methods of inquiry that go beyond imported models. They will need the kind of education that once defined the Gurukuls, now reimagined for a democratic, postcolonial, and globally engaged republic.

In this sense, the Gurukul and Applied India Studies are not opposites, but allies across time. One is the root; the other is the renewal. Together, they represent a continuous thread in India’s educational imagination—an imagination that values not only the accumulation of knowledge, but its application, embodiment, and transmission.