The Institute for Yoga & Consciousness  was established by Prof. K. Rama Krishna Rao when he was the Vice-Chancellor of the University during the VI Plan period and it is one of the developing departments of the University. The Institute was set up by the University for fundamental research on mind-matter interaction. It undertakes empirical and conceptual research on yoga and allied disciplines and carries out extension programmes related to them. Interdisciplinary in approach and international in scope, the Institute attempts to bring together the high technology of the West and the wisdom of the East for a fuller understanding of human nature, an understanding that reflects at once the experimental objectivity of science and the experiential richness of traditional practices. The approach of the Institute is scientific and secular. Therefore, it has no religious orientation or affiliation. It subscribes to the rules of reason and logic and defends facts against fiction and knowledge against superstition.
The Institute has to functionally independent wings; one for research and the other for extension activities. The Research Wings is housed in the Vijayanagaram Place of the University in Waltair Uplands near Pedawaltair Jn. Visakhapatnam - 17. The Extension Wing is located in the Yoga Village overlooking the Bay of Bengal on the Beach Road in Visakhapatnam - 3.
In the last 18 years the Institute carried out over sixty studies on psychological, physiological and parapsychological aspects of yoga, meditation and related variables. The staff of the Institute published about 50 papers in refereed journals, and four books in the regional language. It also publishes the Journal of Indian Psychology: A Journal of Classical and Current Research . The Institute conducted a national conference-cum-workshop on Yoga and Psychology in 1994 and also on Two faces of Consciousness in 1996. The staff of the Institute attended various national and international conferences held in India.
The Yoga Laboratories of the Institute contain an EEG Polywrite System (10 channels), three computers and printers with an internet facility and also a number of tests and instruments for psycho-physiological research. The Institute maintains its own library with over 3000 books and a few journals in related fields. The Institute proposes to organize a reference library which will consist of a national yoga database, the purpose of which is to acquire, classify and catalogue the literature on yoga, both classical and contemporary, and make it available to researchers in India and abroad.
The Institute has sufficient and necessary backward to start courses of instruction and research in Yoga and Consciousness Studies. The Institute at present offers a PG Diploma in Yoga (Part-time) and an interdisciplinary Ph.D. programme with registration in the parent departments. It proposes to start M.A. M.Phil and Ph.D. programmes in Yogic studies.
The Extension Wing of the Institute provides an opportunity for people to improve their quality of life through the study and practice of Yoga. It organizes various yoga training programmes for the public in all walks of life and for the university community and workshops for better living for people in all walks of life including the University community. It started seven years ago a Yoga Therapy Centre which combines yoga and naturopathy for the treatment of various diseases.
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