Humboldt Academy

Humboldt Academy of Bombay (formerly Humboldt Club of Bombay) was founded long ago may be in mid eighties. However, its main activities started in the late nineties. For a long time we had Dr. Paranjpe, the most veteran Humboldt Fellow as President of the Club. Later in 1998 it was taken over by unanimous choice by Dr. S. Banerjee who is now Director BARC. At present Prof. A.S. Khanna is the president of the Humboldt Academy of Bombay.

The main foundation - The Alexander von Humbodlt (AvH), situated at Bonn, Germany, was named after the great explorer and naturalist, 'the last of the greats', as Humboldt is called in one of the Foundations brochures. The Fausts words 'zu sehen, was die welt im lnnersten zusammenhalt' in the masterpiece of that other of our 'greats' and Humboldts contemporary, describes best the sprit of the time. But Humboldt was not only known as outstanding scientist, he was also known for his generosity, humanity, and vision of what science could do. It was his conviction, that research needs international encounter and that it must be sponsored at international level.

The Alexander-von- Humboldt-Foundation of today is actually third of its kind. It was first founded on 19th September, 1860, only one year after Humboldts death on May 6th 1859. It was administered by the Royal Prussian Academy of Sciences and aimed at supporting outstanding talents in all those areas in which Humboldt developed his scientific gifts, to enable to carry out scientific work and to undertake extensive travel. Due to the post-war inflation, the foundation had to discontinue its activities in 1923. Two years later, on April 2, 1925, a new Alexander-von- Humboldt-Foundation was established on December 10, 1953, not least at the suggestion of pre-war- Humboldtians. Its founder, the Federal Republic of Germany, is represented by the Foreign Office. The main source of its funding is the state.

-	Annual Humboldt research fellowship for highly qualified foreign scholars holding doctorates and aged up to 40 years;
-	Annual Humboldt Research Awards for internationally distinguished scholars;
-	Feodor Lynen research fellowship for junior German researchers abroad.
-	Georg Forster Research Fellowships - fellowships for scholars from developing countries