Dr. Indranill Basu-Ray is trained in medicine and cardiology from India and the US. He
has been practicing yoga and meditation for over thirty years now.
Dr. Basu-Ray was born in a middle-class Bengali family in Kolkata, India. From a young
age he was keenly interested in knowing the secrets of this universe and the entity
called ‘God’. This led him to read most of Indian religious and spiritual literature
particularly writings of Swami Vivekananda and Maharishi Aurobindo. He has been
practicing meditation from the age of six years.
He became a disciple of the powerful and esoteric Yogic system Kriya yoga started by
Mahaavatar Babaji, and was initiated by Swami Hariharananda Giri, the direct disciple
of Sri Yukteshwar Giri and a brother disciple of Paramhansa Yogananda. Subsequently
he acquired higher kriyas from other gurus. Dr. Basu-Ray also learnt and practiced
other meditation techniques including Vipassana.
Dr. Basu-Ray has an enduring interest in Mind-Body Medicine, including research
involving brain imaging, hormonal changes, immunological parameters in various states
of consciousness and heart disease. Coronary artery disease is the most common killer
in the Western Hemisphere. Factors studied include the role of emotions and
environmental changes, including adverse environment, in precipitating and sustaining
heart diseases. These include the role of meditation, stress reduction and biofeedback
on the mind-heart axis to prevent and treat cardiovascular pathology initiated in a
stressed organism.
In this course Dr. Basu-Ray will use his meditative experience to underline the basic
tenets of yoga as a powerful tool both for awakening and getting into deeper
concentration to enjoy higher levels of consciousness. Fortunately one of the mundane
effects of yoga practice includes staying young and disease free!