B.K.S Iyengar: World’s yoga guru and India’s global emissary of soft power

If yoga is a global brand today, inspiring millions around the world to pursue wholesome living, much of the credit goes to a man who was born in a small village in Karnataka. With the passing away of Bellur Krishnamachar Sundararaja Iyengar at the ripe age of 95 years, the nation has lost a stalwart in the Indian psycho-physical science of Yoga. Aptly, Yoga is referred as ethos of India’s most inspirational soft power to have created a global impact and to a great extent BKS Iyengar had enhanced this to newer heights. This renowned Yoga Guru, often named as the father of modern Yoga, breathed his last at Pune in India’s western state of Maharashtra on August 20.
As for the celebrities around the world who passionately adopted Iyengar Yoga are the famed violinist Yehudi Menuhin, author Aldous Huxley and cricketer Sachin Tendulkar apart from the highly respected philosopher Jiddu Krishnamurthy. Even the uniformed personnel including the para- military forces have invigorated themselves with yoga. Reportedly, prisons in Israel have adapted Iyengar Yoga as an ideal medium to reform the inmates in the prisons of Israel.

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