Praghna Centre for Research (Praghna) was founded in June 2021 as a not-for-profit educational institute with a singular objective – inculcate and promote scientific tempter among students and emerging scholars. Towards this objective, Praghna has programs and activities in five dimensions:

1) We have established publishing platform through our Journal, Electronic Journal of Social and Strategic Studies, that adheres to best practices in scientific publications.

2)  The second aspect is, conduct Research writing Programs for think tanks and Universities

3) The third initiative is the Praghna-DRAS Research Writing Internship program where a structured and informal interactive method is adopted to mentor students to undertake research programs

4) The fourth dimension is publishing edited and authored books on themes that are of contemporary relevance in International Relations and Strategic Studies. We have published 10 books in the past three years of which six are edited volumes.

5) The fifth dimension is to develop a competitive scientific tempter among students. Towards this purpose, SIX research prizes have been announced, viz.,                                                                                                        

·     V. Rajamanickam Prize: For research paper in political science or historical studies

·      Kalavathi Rajamanickam Prize: For research paper in socio-cultural studies

·      Group Captain Arun Bhatnagar Prize: For research paper in defense studies

·   K.N. Venkatraman Prize: For a research paper in Education and Developmental Studies

·   Lakshmi Venkatraman Prize: For a research paper in Women and Community Development, and Climate Change.

·     Shri Radhe Shyam Gupta Prize for a book pertaining to defense and strategic studies

We have MoUs with think tanks and universities for conducting research methodology workshops/capsules and internship programs. Till now, 25 workshops and orientation talks have been conducted.

Through Praghna-DRaS Research Writing Program, our interns have written 36 research works that have been published online. 

Through these endeavors, we intend to facilitate greater understanding of the world that we live in through scientific research. 

Praghna announced two prizes in 2023. We received 07 Papers for consideration that year. In 2024, two further prizes were added. We received 13 papers and four books for consideration. This year, we have received 20 research papers for consideration.

Each prize has three elements: 1) A cash prize of INR 2000 (Two Thousand only) for each category, 2) An E-Certificate and, 3) Publication of the research work through Electronic Journal of Social and Strategic Studies (ISSN Online: 2582-9645), subject to blind peer review.

We remain grateful to Dr Mohit Kumar Gupta and Captain Ravi Shankar & Dr Meena Ravi Shankar for instituting and sponsoring three prizes in memory of their parents.

The Event

To commemorate our 4th anniversary on 07 June 2025, we had the privilege of having Commodore RS Vasan, Director General Chennai Centre for China Studies as the Chief Guest.

The full event report can be accessed here.

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