Vaman Shivram Apte (1858 – 1892 CE) was an eminent Sanskrit scholar and lexicographer. He hailed from Pune. Despite extreme poverty, Vaman, a remarkably brilliant and diligent student, managed to put himself through the form system of education and got his BA and MA (Sanskrit) degrees and with distinction, winning scholarships and prizes. Like his nationalist student-friends such as Bal Gangadhar Tilak, Vaman also disliked service under a foreign government and chose to serve the cause of education on national lines. He was one of the founder-members of the Deccan Education Society established in 1885 by Tilak, Agarkar, Chiplunkar and other nationalists.
After serving the New English School started by the Deccan
Education Society for some years, he became the first principal of Fergusson
College (1885) in Pune.
Apte was matchless as a teacher and a learned author.
Vaman Shivram Apte Books – Literary Contribution
‘Students’ Hand-book of Progressive Exercise’ and ‘Students Guide
to Sanskrit Composition’ became very popular among students and teachers of
Sanskrit, not only in Maharashtra but in the whole of India.
Even as a student, as well as a teacher, he felt the need
for English-Sanskrit and Sanskrit-English lexicons.
He worked hard and prepared the ‘The Student’s English-Sanskrit
Dictionary (1884) and The Student’s Sanskrit English Dictionary (1890) which immortalized
him.
These dictionaries are rich in references and quotations
from classical works of Kalidasa, Bhavabhuti, Bana and other well-known
Sanskrit poets, playwrights and authors. In the appendices, he has given useful
information about Sanskrit prosody and about the life and work of Sanskrit
authors.