Jamini Bhushan Ray

Jamini Bhushan Ray (1879-1926) was an Indian physician and Sanskrit scholar from Khulna, Bengal, who trained in both Western medicine and classical Ayurveda and built one of Bengal's first institutions to teach Ayurveda through formal, hospital-based clinical instruction rather than informal apprenticeship. After earning a medical degree from Calcutta Medical College in 1905 and studying Ayurveda under Mahamahopadhyay Bijoy Ratna Sen, he practiced obstetrics and gynecology before devoting himself fully to Ayurvedic medicine. In 1916 he founded the Ashtanga Ayurveda College and Hospital in Calcutta, opening with twelve students in a rented building on Fariapukur Street and a curriculum covering all eight classical branches of Ayurveda alongside supervised clinical practice; he served as its first principal. The institution he built continues today as the J.B. Roy State Ayurvedic Medical College and Hospital, making Ray a founding figure in the modern institutionalization of Ayurvedic medical education in India.