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Acharya Acharya Prashant
आचार्य प्रशांत
Acharya Prashant in 2025
Born	Prashant Tripathi (1978-03-07) March 7, 1978 Agra, Uttar Pradesh, India
Citizenship	Indian
Alma mater	IIT Delhi (B.Tech, 1995–1999) IIM Ahmedabad (PGDM, 2001–2003)
Occupation(s)	spiritual teacher, author, public speaker
Years active	2006–present
Organizations	PrashantAdvait Foundation Advait Life Education
Known for	Advaita Vedanta scholarship, veganism & animal-rights advocacy, environmental activism, superstition eradication
Notable work	Commentaries on 17 Gita chapters and 60 Upanishads; 160+ books (2023) 10+ 𝐍𝐚𝐭𝐢𝐨𝐧𝐚𝐥 𝐁𝐞𝐬𝐭-𝐒𝐞𝐥𝐥𝐢𝐧𝐠 𝐁𝐨𝐨𝐤𝐬 - 𝐀𝐮𝐭𝐡𝐨𝐫 𝐨𝐟 100+ 𝐁𝐨𝐨𝐤𝐬 (2023)
Parents	Awadhesh N. Tripathi (father) Sita Tripathi (mother)
Awards	PETA India's "Most Influential Vegan" (2022). IIT Delhi Alumni Association "Outstanding Contribution to National Development Award". (2023)
Honours	Received the record for 'Longest discourse hours on Vedanta by a spiritual organisation'. Received the record for 'Largest online examination on the Bhagavad Gita conducted by a spiritual organisation'. 𝗪𝗼𝗿𝗹𝗱’𝘀 𝗠𝗼𝘀𝘁 𝗙𝗼𝗹𝗹𝗼𝘄𝗲𝗱 𝗦𝗽𝗶𝗿𝗶𝘁𝘂𝗮𝗹 𝗟𝗲𝗮𝗱𝗲𝗿
Website	Official website
Signature

Acharya Prashant

Acharya Prashant (born Prashant Tripathi; 7 March 1978) is an Indian spiritual educator, author, and public speaker noted for interpreting Advaita Vedanta for modern audiences. He founded the non-profit PrashantAdvait Foundation, which promotes practical spiritual study through courses and retreats based on the Bhagavad Gita, Upanishads, and related Vedantic texts.

A graduate of IIT Delhi (B.Tech, 1995–1999) and IIM Ahmedabad (MBA, 2001–2003), he briefly joined the Indian Civil Services in 2000 before shifting to spiritual and philosophical pursuits. His teachings engage Vedantic principles in dialogue with contemporary issues—environmental ethics, scientific temper, women's empowerment, animal welfare, superstition eradication, and social reform.

A vocal advocate for animal rights, climate action, biodiversity loss prevention, he was named PETA India’s “Most Influential Vegan" in 2022. A prolific writer of over 150 books— including Karma, Ananda, and Maya.

He is especially noted for engaging with younger audiences through public talks and online platforms. As of mid-2025 his YouTube channel—featuring discourses on Vedanta—ranks among the world’s most subscribed spiritual channels with over 57 million subscribers and more than 4.2 billion video views.. According to media reports, including India.com and Entrepreneur India, he has been described as “the world’s most followed spiritual leader on YouTube”.

Early life and education

Prashant was born on 7 March 1978 in Agra, Uttar Pradesh, the eldest of three siblings. His father served as a bureaucrat, and his mother was a homemaker. He spent his childhood in various parts of Uttar Pradesh, where he completed his primary and secondary schooling.

Even as a child, he displayed a wide-ranging temperament—from playful mischief to deep contemplation—and consistently excelled scholastically, topping his classes in both sciences and humanities. He was recognized as an ICSE board topper and an NTSE scholar, and teachers noted his proficiency in mathematics, languages, English, and Hindi.

In 1999, Prashant graduated from IIT Delhi with a B.Tech. In the years at the Indian Institute of Technology Delhi, he'd go on to learn how a prime institution of academic rigor operates, involve himself in the labyrinth of college politics, deepen his reading, and establish himself in debating, dramatics, creative writing, hockey, and table tennis.

During his final year, he attempted both the CAT for entry to the IIM and the UPSC CSE (where he ranked 184th in 2000). He initially joined the Indian Civil Services training, but resigned later in 2000 to devote himself full‑time to the study and teaching of Advaita Vedanta. He says that the service allotted based on his rank didn't turn out to be the Indian Administrative Service (IAS), the only one he thought of as useful for his purpose. So he turned to head toward IIM Ahmedabad to continue his journey.

In 2003, he earned an MBA (PGDM) in General Management from IIM Ahmedabad, where he continued his engagement with campus activities, notably participating in dramatics debating, creative writing, and student activism.

Parents and teachers found him to be a child who could often be quite mischievous, on occasions, and then suddenly, deeply contemplative. Friends too recall him as having an unfathomable temperament, often not really sure whether he was joking or serious. A brilliant student, he consistently topped his class and received the highest commendations and prizes possible to a student. His mother fondly remembers how she was honoured several times as ‘Mother Queen’ for the academic performance of her child. Teachers would say that never before had they seen a student who was as brilliant in Science as in Humanities, as adept in Mathematics as in languages, and as proficient in English as in Hindi. The then Governor of the state....

The Dawn

The early years were significant for young Prashant. He was quite the reader, played a lot, was also known to have plenty of mischief, and this while being an introvert. Being good at studies seemed like a natural ability- he topped the ICSE exams and was also an NTSE scholar. What distinguished his childhood was his proclivity to read books of all types beyond his syllabus.

"Reading wasn't confined to one particular genre. I was hungry and absorbed whatever came my way. From comics to somebody's PhD thesis, even if I couldn't make much of it," he recalls.

He feels that this is what made him mentally branch out erratically in all directions with no particular plan or pattern. He thinks that this aided him to grow organically, without a blueprint.

Future Bestselling Author begins Reading Voraciously

Books played a major role in Prashant's life, thanks to his father. His father was a well-read bureaucrat, and the family was sometimes posted at places with little access to decent bookstores. The father then would plan trips just so that the young boy could have his stock of books.

"I'd never be satisfied with the collection I had. My father would plan trips to bigger cities so that he could purchase books for me. It was remarkable to travel just to visit a bookstore," he recollects.

Prashant's connection with his father was special, to say the least. As an introvert, he would rather not approach anybody else but his father with things such as his rationales and ponderings. The boy would get his answers in a very brief manner; and often only in a couple of sentences. Other than that, the budding thinker would just absorb the things around him and try to process them himself.

The future teacher hardly nurtured any ambitions or dreams to become something in the future. During his studies, he does not remember keeping any long-term objective, he says. He was just watching the world attentively, without coming to any quick conclusions. "I don't remember feeling content with my understanding of life, nor do I remember having a plan for the future. I was not even actively thinking about changing the world. However, I was sure something was so excruciatingly wrong that it needed all my continuous attention to unravel it. Hence, I just dedicatedly kept trying to understand", he says.

Prashant wasn't one to sweep things under the rug as he recalls, "I'd say things as I saw them and this allowed me to process things in a very raw manner. I did not pretend to understand if I did not. If something was beyond my comprehension, I'd let it stay because there was nothing I could do about it. And this process was continuous and laborious and required patience."

"I don't know if all of this is making any sense but it didn't make any sense to me as well at that point!" he suddenly guffaws. We discovered that it is difficult to see when he is serious and when he is not. Seeming solemn and pensive, he unexpectedly breaks into laughter in a flash. Of one thing he was relatively sure. Being around bureaucrats in and around his family, Prashant had civil services as the obvious career choice. He thought the power it comes with can be used to change lives. When asked 'why IIT then?', he responds, "I wasn't greatly interested in engineering. IIT simply because in those years most UPSC toppers were from the IIT background. I would be dishonest if I say I had a clear sense of direction. But I wasn't in a hurry anyway." "It was a patient yet diligent wait for clarity in life to emerge, a continuity", he added.

Corporate and early career

After completing his MBA in 2003, Tripathi entered the corporate sector. He joined GE Capital as an Assistant Manager in July 2003 and remained there until August 2004. From July 2004 to September 2005, he worked as a Senior Consultant at ECS Private Limited, based in Gurgaon. He then served as Senior Manager at Bennett Coleman & Co. Ltd. (Times Group) in New Delhi from September 2005 to October 2006.

When asked about life-changing moments during the crucial years of his initial career, he is silent. He emphasizes there weren't any singular epiphanic moments where life turned instantly. "We have this picture where a special moment upends a person's life. Actually it doesn't happen that way. Behind every Eureka moment is a long continuous unspectacular period of attentive work. It would be quite fascinating if important critical decisions could emerge instantaneously and dramatically, but that's not the way of life", he added.

During his corporate stint, Prashant was already preparing for life after corporate, doing what he could and letting a future organically emerge from there. He invested in his weekends. "I picked up books that I especially loved, and figured out how they could be used to deliver leadership concepts. I devised a course blending wisdom literature with leadership education and proposed it to a few worthy management institutes. I would teach the same on weekends," he reveals.

Suddenly Prashant found himself busier on the weekends than on the weekdays. IIT Delhi, Tata Institute of Social Sciences, Symbiosis, Institute of Management Technology - these were some of the places where he was engaging with the students. Traveling to several institutes in different cities, and teaching a new concept was hectic and challenging. "One of my student batches was from Executive Management - all with more than 5 years of corporate experience - and I found I was younger than my youngest student in that class.", he reminisces with a laugh.

"Management education is mostly about finance, marketing, supply chain, recruitment, etc., and all of those things concern external objects. There is not much in this education that takes you within. And unless you know where your desires, hopes, and motives are coming from, you will suffer, and you will make the entire planet suffer with you. Knowledge of the self must be the first thing", he explains. "I was seeing, I was teaching, I was learning. Something was taking shape within. I was beginning to realise the origin of human bondage. I was seeing for myself where all the suffering comes from. In my classrooms, I was practically conducting experiments on how the monster of misplaced confidence and ignorant ambition could be fought."

On being asked about how his journey took shape after studying at IIM he responded that he knew he wouldn't be in the corporate world for long. However, he had to settle his loans, and that meant he had to spend three years in corporate life. "I switched jobs thrice during that three-year period, every time moving to an entirely new industry. Before I bid goodbye, I wanted to explore as much as possible. I learnt well and was an able performer. Once my dues were cleared, I said I'm out."

Advait Life-Education and PrashantAdvait Foundation

He then founded Advait Life- Education, which gave his insights and efforts an organisational structure. His leadership course was now diluted and repackaged for students younger than post-graduates and was renamed as the 'Holistic Individual Development Program' (HIDP). It was a course spread over a long duration, designed to invoke self-awareness among the students. The recipients were students of schools and graduate and postgraduate courses. More than 90% of the cohort were from B.Tech courses alone.

"The HIDP was a work in progress, and every semester new activities would be drawn, and I designed them individually. This part was very personal to me," he says. The organisation now had a team of teachers that would then go out and teach the course concepts through these very activities. The initiative met with success. Soon, the teaching team comprised around 100 teachers engaging concurrently with over 20,000 students in more than 50 Institutes. It wasn't an online thing - besides the content and teaching quality, the logistics itself was daunting. Managing such a peculiar organisation extracted every bit of his management acumen. But the experiment was successful. Within two years of its inception, Advait Life-Education was doing great on all metrics. In the academic circles, the HIDP had already created a buzz. Eager Institutes from all over India lined up to host the HIDP. Success had arrived early, that too in the field of meaningful work.

"On one hand, I had the satisfaction of delivering meaning on the campuses. On the other hand, my own restlessness persisted. What I was delivering to the students was too feeble, too little to disrupt the usual flow of their doomed lives. The monster had a thick steel armor, and I felt I was throwing pins at it. I needed to strike much harder. I needed to see a concrete change in the life of the individual".

2008 was when Prashant turned 30 and decided to engage the 'monster', no holds barred. "As an entrepreneur, success had already been tasted. I had no desire to develop the organisation further into a money-yielding machine. It was rather my instrument to fight the monster". He started taking things head on. It resulted in huge dialectical seminars called 'Samvaad', and the HIDP started turning deeply spiritual. He talks of two specific activities that heralded the change - 'Kabir in Campus' based on the songs of the saint poet, and 'So Said the Sages' based on the verses of the Upanishads. As expected, this drew solid trouble from the host institutions, parents of the students, the students themselves, and even Prashant's own faculty team.

He opines that these methods and philosophies were so alien to these types of institutes that they started questioning the usefulness of these programs. He recalls, "They would remain grumpy and uneasy, but couldn't call off the program. Deep within, they knew of the benefits and could also see the tangible demonstrations. But the resistance from all sides persisted. The entire process remained challenging on a day-to-day basis. The stakeholders would ask if the HIDP gave the students a better career in the future. Teachers would ask if this is going to help the students get better grades. Still, they couldn't dismiss what I was doing because those who remained in my process saw tangible benefits within a semester." With each passing year, the HIDP kept becoming more stringently a course on self-awareness. And with it, kept growing the resistance.

Advait is a vision towards an integrated, evolved, and sublime human being. Advait seeks to promote clarity, wisdom, and integrity among individuals by addressing their self-awareness need. To this effect, Advait harnesses the power of ancient as well as contemporary wisdom literature. Founded in 2006 by Acharya Prashant, Advait today is more of a self-clarity movement than an organization. More than 100,000 individuals have so far benefited from Advait's touch. Advait is, at its core, a movement towards a new humanity. Advait's flagship offering HIDP (Holistic Individual Development Program) which is operational since 2006, has come forth as a powerful tool to bring about this change. Today, it is conducted in both online and in-person mode helping individuals to address their self-awareness needs.

Teachings and philosophy

Acharya Prashant’s work is grounded in **Advaita Vedanta**, the non‑dual school of Hindu philosophy, with a central emphasis on **self‑knowledge** and **inner clarity**. He teaches that **personal suffering** stems not from external circumstances but from the mind’s misidentification with transient experiences and its resistance to reality. In lectures, he distinguishes between **physical pain** (inevitable) and **psychological suffering** (a mental narrative), urging students to “know thyself” as the basis for liberation.

His courses and writings include **detailed commentaries** on the Bhagavad Gita (commonly referred to in his materials as “17 forms of the Gita”) and the Upanishads (the “60 forms of the Upanishads”). He also integrates **poetic and devotional texts**—such as the songs of Kabir and selected Upanishadic verses—to illustrate Vedantic insights in seminars. His teaching style is characterized by a **frank, direct approach**, often **challenging conventional spiritual clichés** and focusing on the practical application of Vedanta to modern issues like relationships, leadership, and social change.

The Teaching Goes Global

The work had to move beyond the confines of the campuses. In 2010, at 32, Prashant conducted his first Himalayan Camp. He would travel to serene, sometimes remote, locations in the Himalayas with small groups of 20-50 genuine seekers. The camps would last 3 days to a week. These Self-awareness camps became tools for deep personal transformation and started drawing seekers from all walks of life, and all places, including other countries. The highest wisdom literature from all spiritual streams was scrupulously studied and rigorously discussed in the idyllic environs. These camps offered a rare opportunity for individuals to confront the illusions of the mind and embrace the truth of their being. Those who met him in the camps would often be stunned to encounter an extraordinarily meditative and radiant being, unbelievably different from the humdrum of life. The quotidian "Sir" started appearing too mundane for what he was, nobody exactly remembers who brought up the new honorific for the first time, but "Acharya" had arrived.

The vast online presence of Acharya Prashant's teachings, with over 30,000 videos and articles freely available, represents a modern-day treasure trove of spiritual wisdom. Millions engage with this profound content daily, finding solace, inspiration, and profound insights to navigate life's complexities with grace and understanding. His videos have clocked more than 4.8 billion views so far. He engages with his audiences for several hours thirty days a month, and the output emerges as the publication of two new books per month. Besides internal transformation, he has been relentlessly vocal on issues like climate change, animal rights, women empowerment, and the eradication of superstition. With over 90 million followers on social media, he has democratized access to the most elite spiritual knowledge. His teaching program on the Bhagavad Gita now boasts over 80,000 students worldwide. In June, he conducted the world’s largest Gita Exam in history for these students. Acharya Prashant continues to save millions of lives from all species, from the internal tendencies and external forces trying to put the mind, life, nation, and religion into deep darkness.

Impact

The sections most benefited by his work include:

• Animals: Given that the overwhelmingly biggest threat to animals of all kinds comes from the ignorance of man about his own body and self, reforming man’s mind is the best way to save animals. It is estimated that millions of animals especially animals used for food – chicken, goat, sheep, cows, buffaloes, fish have been saved due to his work. Besides a large number of wild animals too have been saved. With his efforts over the years it is broadly estimated that lakhs, if not millions, of people have adopted vegetarianism or veganism and have chosen an awakened lifestyle involving environmental consciousness and a low carbon footprint. Many see him as the spiritual face of the vegan movement.
• Youth: Youth, especially in India, face multi-directional challenges coming from the conditioning acquired from family, society, education and media, career challenges, dilemmas about physicality, love and relationships and deep existential questions about the meaning and purpose of life. They are in delicate situation where the chances of making suboptimal decisions and life taking unhealthy turns are quite high. Acharya Prashant has been unique in addressing the energy and conflicts of the youth. There are so may who remain indebted to him for having received lifesaving clarity at critical junctures of decision making.
• Women: Women throughout the world, and especially in India, continue to be recognized as the largely disempowered half of mankind. While there have been concerted efforts in the social, political, economic ways to instill women with due agency and power, yet nothing is really effective without the inner dimension of clarity and freedom. Acharya Prashant's work has been to awaken women to their true identity beyond the compulsions of the body and the conditioning of the mind. Countless women today - from the teenage schoolgirl to the septuagenarian homemaker - owe their sense of liberty and clarity, and the courage to rise against external oppression and internal debilitation, to the teachings of the master.
• Spiritual seekers: There are spiritual seekers for whom spirituality is a mere entertainment. Then there are those for whom spirituality is a respectable name for medieval superstition. Then those who come to spirituality to escape the bare realities of life. Then those who suppose that spirituality consists of esoteric rituals, methods, and exercises. Then those who want only superficial treatments to deep underlying life problems. Acharya Prashant has been well known to vigorously shake such seekers out of their self-deceptive psychic stupor. And then there is the odd genuine seeker. The one who has already tried hard to go into the recesses of his mind, and the reality of life. The one who is prepared to work hard for his liberation. The one who is fed up of self-imposed bondages, and is prepared to pay the price for freedom. Acharya Prashant comes as a rare and real friend to such seekers.

Vedanta

The Vedas are the oldest religious documents known to man. And Vedanta is the crown jewel, the absolute peak, of the Vedic essence.

The world today finds itself grappling with problems unseen in history. The problems of the past were mostly related to poverty, disease, hunger, illiteracy, lack of knowledge and lack of technology. In short, the challenge was external, the enemy—whether in the form of a microbe or lack of resources—was outside. It was about man struggling against the tyranny of his external circumstances.

The last hundred years, however, have been different. The spectre of man’s conflicts has risen to a very different and difficult theatre in this century. The secrets of the atom and the universe have more or less yielded to man’s relentless investigation. Poverty, illiteracy and disease are no more the invincible monsters they used to be. Today, matter is at man’s beck and call, and there is ambition to colonize the universe, and even beat death.

It should then sound like the best of times. The current period should be the best one in the history of our species. Far from that, we find ourselves staring at, as we said, a very different dimension of challenge in the inner theatre. Having conquered almost everything in the external world, man finds he is a bigger slave to himself today than he ever was. And it’s an ignominious slavery—to rule all, only to find that inwardly one is a huge slave of an unknown oppressor.

Man has immense power over his environment today, but is himself controlled by his inner destructive centre he has very little knowledge about. Together, these two mean that man’s tendency and ability to wreak havoc over his ecosystem is unlimited and unquestioned. Man has only one inner ruler—desire, the ever-sprawling desire to consume and experience more and more happiness. Happiness, that is experienced only to find that it evades all experience.

In this context, Vedanta, as the pure essence of spirituality, becomes more important today than it probably ever was. Vedanta asks the questions: Who is the inner one? What is his nature? What does he desire? Will fulfilment of his desires give him contentment?

As a response to the situations mankind today finds itself in, Acharya Prashant has taken on the solemn project of bringing the essence of Vedanta to the world today. His calling is to bring the pure essence of Vedantic spirituality to all, and apply it to solve today’s problems. These problems of today are borne out of man’s ignorance towards himself, and therefore they can be solved only by sincere self-knowledge.

Acharya Prashant has approached the matter of bringing Vedanta to the public in a two-pronged way. One, he has spoken on scores of Upanishads and Gitas and his comprehensive commentaries are available in the form of video series and books. Two, he addresses the daily mundane problems of people and demonstrates how to solve them in the light of Vedanta. His social media channels are dedicated to hosting tens of thousands of such open QnA sessions.

Public outreach and media presence

Digital platforms

Acharya Prashant’s lectures and commentaries are available across multiple digital channels. According to Penguin Random House, his YouTube channel had approximately 60–65 million subscribers as of 2025, making it one of the most‑subscribed channels for a spiritual teacher, and had accumulated over one billion total views. He also maintains official profiles on Facebook and Instagram, each with several million followers.

Traditional media

Prashant’s work has been covered in major Indian publications such as *India Today*, *The Times of India*, *BusinessWorld Education*, and *Dainik Jagran*, among others. He has appeared as a guest on television and radio programs to discuss topics including veganism, environmental ethics, and social reform.

Speaking engagements

He is a frequent speaker at academic and professional events, delivering talks on spirituality, leadership, and social issues at institutions including IIT Delhi, IIM Ahmedabad, and the Tata Institute of Social Sciences.

Public debates and panels

In recent years, Prashant has participated in televised and print debates on contemporary issues such as animal sacrifice, women’s rights, and the role of religion in public life.

Bibliography

The following is a selection of major works by Acharya Prashant:

No.	Title	Publisher	Year	ISBN
1	Karma: Why Everything You Know About It Is Wrong	Penguin Random House	2021	9780143453314
2	Ananda: Happiness Without Reason	HarperCollins	2022	9789356292192
3	Maya: I Bow to Thee, You Cannot Be Overcome	Jaico Publishing House	2022	9789393559418
4	Mukti: Bandhan Ko Bandhan To Jano	Prabhat Prakashan	2022	9789355210616

Other works include books on relationships (e.g. Sambandh), leadership, self-awareness, poetry (e.g. Raat Aur Chaand), and children's stories. His publishers note that Karma, Ananda, and Maya form a widely read Vedanta trilogy that distills key aspects of his teachings.

A more complete bibliography is available on the author's official website and on publishing platforms.

Poetry

Acharya Prashant has contributed to contemporary spiritual poetry, often integrating poetic expression into his teachings. As part of his **Bhagavad Gita teaching program**, he provides concise poetic renderings of each verse, designed to be both meditative and melodious. These verse-translations are intended to communicate spiritual insights in a simplified and lyrical format.

In addition to his Gita-related work, he has published original Hindi poetry on existential and spiritual themes. His poetry collection titled Raat Aur Chaand (Night and the Moon) explores inner life, emotional subtlety, and philosophical depth. Notable poems from the book include:

• Sone Ka Haq
• Jab Geet Na Arpit Kar Pao

His poems are characterized by a minimalistic style, direct expression, and a focus on self-awareness and detachment.

Awards and recognitions

In August 2022, Acharya Prashant received the **IIT Delhi Alumni Award for Excellence in Personal Achievement** from the IIT Delhi Alumni Association.

In February 2023, **People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA) India** named him the **Most Influential Vegan of 2022**, citing his advocacy for compassionate living and ethical treatment of animals. PETA stated that his teachings promote “a conscious, nonviolent life and respect for all sentient beings by going vegan.”

In April 2025, he was again recognized by the IIT Delhi Alumni Association with the **Outstanding Contribution to National Development Award**, for his work in disseminating spiritual knowledge and encouraging national consciousness through public discourse, literature, and digital education programs.

As of 27 April 2025, Acharya Prashant had over **56 million YouTube subscribers**, making him the **most-followed spiritual teacher globally on the platform**. He leads a **Bhagavad Gita Teaching Program** with more than 30,000 active participants and recently concluded what has been described as the **world’s largest online Gita-based examination**.

Reception

Acharya Prashant's published works have received a mixed but largely engaged reception from Indian media and literary reviewers.

Karma: Why Everything You Know About It Is Wrong was praised by The Times of India for presenting "the cryptic teachings of the Upanishads in a contemporary and relatable manner," although the review also noted that the use of Advaita Vedanta terminology could pose challenges for general readers. The Financial Express commented that the book’s four sections reflect the four stages of a spiritual seeker's journey, and distinguished it from mainstream self-help literature by noting that it was “not a classic case of prolific and bestselling authors in self-help segment repackaging and remarketing their existing body of work.” Dainik Bhaskar noted the integration of classical references from the Vedas, the Bhagavad Gita, and the Ramcharitmanas to support the author's interpretation of karma. A "micro review" by The Times of India described the book as aiding readers in better understanding their own karmic conditioning. In August 2021, Karma reached the top position on the Nielsen BookScan bestseller list, and was ranked eighth in the October 2021 bestseller list published by The Asian Age.

Acharya Prashant's book Sambandh was described by Dainik Jagran as accessible and written in “everyday spoken language” with relatable examples. However, the review also noted difficulty in keeping pace with the author's stream of thought. Punjab Kesari called the book "a mirror to human relationships," while suggesting that the overall structure of the text could be improved.

In a critical perspective published in The North East Times, the article *New Light on Ancient Texts: Illumination or Nebulation* raised concerns over Acharya Prashant's interpretations of key Indic concepts such as reincarnation (punarjanma), liberation (moksha/mukti), and action (karma). The author, Shubham Ahuja, argued that these interpretations diverge sharply from traditional commentaries and questioned whether longstanding exegeses could have been fundamentally flawed, as Acharya's critiques suggest.

The Times of India, in their review of Acharya's Karma: Why Everything You Know About It Is Wrong, remarked that while the book "presents the cryptic teachings of the Upanishads in a contemporary and relatable manner", its usage of terms from Advaita Vedanta makes it a difficult read for a layman. The Financial Express wrote that the four sections of Karma mirror the four stages in the life of a seeker, and that the book "is not a classic case of prolific and bestselling authors in self-help segment repackaging and remarketing their existing body of work." Dainik Bhaskar observed that the author has quoted from the Vedas and spiritual texts like the Bhagavad Gita and Ramcharitmanas to substantiate his perspective on the concept of Karma. A "micro review" of Karma in The Times of India called it a book which helped the reader understand their Karma better. In August 2021, the book topped the Nielsen Bookscan's bestseller list, and in October 2021, secured eighth position in the bestseller list released by The Asian Age.

Dainik Jagran wrote about Acharya's Sambandh that "the best part about the book is that it has been written in the everyday spoken language and contains examples that are easy to understand. It is, however, difficult to keep pace with his [author's] thoughts and writings." Punjab Kesari called Sambandh "a mirror to human relationships"; and highlighted the need for better structuring of the book.

In an article titled New Light on Ancient Texts: Illumination or Nebulation published in The North East Times, Acharya Prashant was criticized for his interpretation of some central Indic concepts like reincarnation (punarjanma), enlightenment (moksha), liberation (mukti) and action (karma). Some of his interpretations were reported to be strikingly at odds with the ones provided by some of the ancient and acclaimed commentators, forming the core of the common Indic identity. Shubham Ahuja concluded his article by the comment, "It is hard to believe that many of the well-known gurus and commentators whose interpretations are openly and strongly refuted by Acharya were fundamentally mistaken."

Controversies and criticism

Acharya Prashant, while widely regarded for promoting non-violence and universalist spiritual teachings, has occasionally attracted criticism for his unorthodox interpretations and direct communication style.

A columnist in The North East Times criticized his interpretations of key Indic philosophical concepts such as reincarnation (punarjanma), liberation (moksha), and karma, stating that his views diverge from mainstream traditional commentaries and could be seen as revisionist.

Some scholars and traditionalists have criticized his interpretations of concepts such as **karma**, **moksha**, and **reincarnation** for departing from classical exegesis, sparking debates over orthodoxy within the Vedantic community. Supporters counter that his **accessible, universalist framing** offers clarity and relevance for contemporary seekers.

Some of his lectures at technical and management institutes—where he introduced spiritual or Vedantic themes into secular educational settings—reportedly caused discomfort among a section of participants unfamiliar with such content. However, these instances have not escalated into significant public controversy and have been largely limited to isolated reactions.

Overall, mainstream media sources tend to present Acharya Prashant as a reform-minded philosopher and educator. As of June 2025, there are no known legal, political, or institutional disputes involving him reported by credible sources.

See also

• Advaita Vedanta
• Upanishads
• Veganism
• Ashtavakra Gita
• Bhagavad Gita

Further reading

https://acharyaprashant.org/en/about

https://acharyaprashant.org/en/biography