The one-of-a-kind award was instituted by Smt. Sunitha Madhavan, great-granddaughter of Shri V Venkayya. The Award commemorates Rai Bahadur Shri V Venkayya, a pioneering Epigrapher who was the first Indian Chief Epigraphist to the Government of India.
The annual V Venkayya Epigraphy Award (VVE Award) aims to recognize exceptional individual contributions, in any Indian language, towards the discovery of unrecorded inscriptions, interpretation of inscriptions from a refreshingly new perspective, dissemination of wealth of knowledge contained in them by conventional as well as digital medium and preservation of Epigraphic resources for posterity.
The recipient was selected by a jury consisting of experts in epigraphy, history, archaeology, and heritage.
Dr Padigar will receive the Award on Saturday, July 26, 2025, at an Award function from the Chief Guest of the occasion, Dr T.S. Ravishankar, Director – Epigraphy (Retd), Archaeological Survey of India, Mysuru. He will also deliver the Award Lecture on "Beyond the Texts: Insights from Early Chalukya Inscriptions”.
Do join us at 6.00 pm IST on Saturday, July 26th, 2025, for this event at Arkay Convention Centre, Mylapore, Chennai 600004.
Dr. Shrinivas V. Padigar is a distinguished historian, epigraphist, and archaeologist whose scholarship has profoundly shaped the understanding of India’s early historical and cultural narratives, especially the Kannada region. Currently the Director (Academic and Research) at The Mythic Society, Bengaluru, he has had an illustrious academic career spanning over three decades, primarily at Karnatak University, Dharwad, where he rose to become Professor and Chairman of the Department of Ancient Indian History and Epigraphy.
A gold medalist and Ph.D. from Karnatak University (1985), Dr. Padigar has held several prestigious fellowships, including the Infosys Foundation Karnataka Chair at BORI, Pune, a Senior Academic Fellowship from the ICHR, and a Charles Wallace Fellowship in the UK. He has also served as a visiting fellow at institutions like Deccan College and the University of Edinburgh.
His scholarly contributions are extensive and interdisciplinary, encompassing epigraphy, art history, archaeology, numismatics, and religious studies. He has reexamined, edited, and critically reinterpreted over 400 inscriptions, especially from the Early Chalukya period. The result was his magnum opus Inscriptions of the Calukyas of Badami (2010).
His research has shed new light on the Saiva and Vaishnava traditions, educational institutions, temple architecture, and sculptural iconography in the Deccan, often drawing on inscriptional and archaeological evidence.
Apart from Inscriptions of the Calukyas of Badami, his significant publications are Vishnu Cult in Karnataka (1996), alongside several works in Kannada such as "Puratattvashastra Parichaya" and numerous edited volumes such as Pratnakirti and New Facets of Indian Art. His writings explore themes from narrative sculpture—like the Panchatantra and Jataka depictions—to socio-religious practices and artisanal histories.
He has supervised 13 doctoral theses, delivered invited lectures across India, and presided over national academic conferences. In recognition of his pioneering work, he has received the Rajarshi Dr. Veerendra Heggade Award (2023) and the Dr. B.R. Gopal Epigraphist’s Award (2016).
With a rare blend of methodological precision and visionary insight, Dr. Padigar remains a leading voice in the fields of Indian epigraphy and ancient cultural studies—an enduring influence and a most deserving winner of the V. Venkayya Epigraphy Award, 2025.
