Official website for Rishikula
T.A.P.A.S
Transdisciplinary Academy for Planetary Awareness & Sustainability
The Transdisciplinary Academy for Planetary Awareness & Sustainability (TAPAS) is a living bridge between ancient wisdom and modern science. Conceived within the Rishikula Foundation, TAPAS arises from a simple but powerful conviction that our planet can no longer be understood through fragmented disciplines and must be approached as a living, sacred whole.
TAPAS brings together hydrology, biodiversity, climate emergency and remote sensing, agroecology and village livelihoods, dharmic water ethics and contemporary environmental policy. It is research, yes, but research rooted in reverence, where data is not merely collected but consecrated, interpreted, and returned to the communities it serves.
The Academy’s first pilot, the Asi Ganga Research Centre (ARC), is being established in the sacred Bannerghatta National Park, near Bengaluru. It is dedicated to the living memory of Devi Aranyani, a Rig Vedic goddess brought to life after 5000 years. The park is large enough to be studied and intimate enough for TAPAS to listen, learn, and build a model replicable across the forests of India.
TAPAS works through ten integrated domains: Water, climate hazards, data systems, WaSH and environmental health, agroecology, governance and policy, Indian Knowledge Systems, biodiversity, participatory methods, cow economy and community education. These disciplines converge to restore springs, revive catchments, rebuild resilience, create open data commons, and empower villagers—especially women and youth—to become guardians of the forests, biodiversity and water sources around them.
TAPAS is not only an academy; it is a pledge: to study without exploitation, to serve without superiority, and to heal without haste. It is a call to awaken the ancient partnership between humanity and Earth.
In the voice of the Valley itself, TAPAS is our collective sādhanā for the planet—a disciplined, loving effort to restore mother nature’s balance, dignity, and flow.
Awaken the planetary consciousness
Those wishing to explore TAPAS are invited to SRiM – the Monthly Satsang by Gurumata
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