T Denny Sanford, Prof Pradeep Khosla get honorary doctorates from Amrita Vishwa Vidyapeetham

Mata Amritanandamayi Devi (Amma), Amrita’s Chancellor, awarded the degrees for their initiatives to uplift humanity, a release said.

Sanford is among the world's richest people, known for his wish to “die broke” by providing for people in need. His total giving to date is more than USD 1.6 billion, with which he has established charitable initiatives for medical innovation, improved health care, and pediatric medicine.

This includes Sanford Health, a group of 47 non-profit hospitals that is the largest rural health system in the United States. He is also the founder of the Sanford Project, which funds efforts in finding a cure for Type 1 Diabetes and is the benefactor of UCSD's Institute for Empathy and Compassion.

Born in Mumbai, Prof. Pradeep K. Khosla is a distinguished academic leader and electrical and computer engineer who became UCSD's eighth Chancellor in 2012.

UCSD is an academic and research powerhouse that is recognized as one of the top 15 research universities in the world. Prof. Khosla is heading initiatives fueled by technology to foster collaboration and solve societal challenges.

He initiated UCSD's first-ever Strategic Plan and raised USD 3.05 billion, exceeding its original goal by more than USD 1 billion.

With these efforts, he has significantly expanded college access and affordability for underserved populations initiated interdisciplinary research, and strengthened university and community relationships and partnerships.

Accepting the honour, Sanford said: “I am deeply moved by the work you are doing here and being a part of that with our Compassion program where we will be joining hands and hearts and minds.

"Not only the program that I created for very young children starting from pre-school up to middle school—which now reaches 22 million kids in the United States—but also to work closely with Amma’s institutions here in India, the USA, and globally. There is a lot of alignment and synergy between my programs and objectives and Amma’s work.”

He added: “The Sanford Centre for Harmony will work with Amma’s programs such as Live-in-Labs to complement, extend and enhance each other."

While accepting the honorary doctorate, Prof. Khosla said: “Amrita has much in common with UC San Diego. We are both multi-disciplinary, research-focused, and top-ranked. We both have a demonstrated history of preparing promising minds to be leaders in whatever path they choose to pursue. We both nurture a diverse, inclusive, collaborative environment on- and off-campus."

Addressing the audience, Amma congratulated both the recipients of the honorary doctorates and said: “The peak of research is compassion, and once you have reached that, everything else is revealed. Research is happening in so many areas, but once you become compassionate, that is the crown jewel of life for the entire world.

"It makes all our actions sweet and fragrant. And then having the intention to research compassion itself is significant. We should have deep appreciation to Sanford that he undertook that, as it is the action of a great mind.”