Prof. Sabita Acharya

Professor Sabita Acharya is the first woman Indian Anthropologist to be appointed as the Vice-Chancellor of one of India’s leading Universities in the state of Odisha. She is specialized in Social and Cultural Anthropology and received her Ph.D. in 1991 from Utkal University on Anthropology of Pilgrimage at Puri and Simhachalam. Her book Pilgrimage of Indian Civilization is highly acclaimed by researchers and students alike. She has published more than 60 research articles and three books. In 2002, she went to Oxford, UK. on a Commonwealth Post-Doctoral Fellowship. She also travelled for various international conferences of IUAES for delivering lectures to China, UK, Brazil, Poland and as visiting fellow to Tübingen and Goethe University, Germany. Her research work is mainly focused on tribal and particularly vulnerable tribal groups (PVTG) in the state of Odisha. She taught for more than thirty years, and was also the Chairperson of Post Graduate Council, and Director of College Development Council, Utkal University (2019-2020). As the Director, School of Women Studies, she introduced various outreach programmes for gender sensitization and for makings institutions gender neutral workspaces.