TRANSLATION OF SANSKRIT TEXTS INTO PERSIAN DURING AKBAR EMPEROR

Akbar was the third emperor of the Mughal Empire. He was a patron of art and culture, fond of Indian literature, and created a library of over 24,000 volumes written in Sanskrit, Persian, Arabic, Kashmiri, etc. Akbar wanted to establish a strong kingdom in India, and his desire to rule effectively compelled him to encourage the indigenous language, Sanskrit. He commanded his courtiers to translate Sanskrit works into Persian, including the Atharva Veda, the Upanishads, the Rāmāyana, the Mahābhārata, the Bhagavad Gītā, and other Purānas. Initially, Akbar’s Persian scholars translated the Sanskrit epic Mahābhārata into Persian. The famous Persian scholar Abul-Fazl refined the raw translation into poetic verses. Akbar’s Rāmāyana is a prose translation of all seven books of Vālmīki’s Sanskrit Rāmāyana into Persian. This demonstrates the significant literary fusion of Sanskrit and Persian languages during Akbar’s reign.