Nay Pyi Taw October 22
Chairman of State Administration Council Prime Minister Senior General Min Aung Hlaing, accompanied by wife Daw Kyu Kyu Hla, the entourage, the Shan State chief minister, the Eastern Command commander and officials, visited Shan State Buddhist University (SSBU) in Phayaphyu Ward, Pant in village-tract, Taunggyi, Shan State (South) this afternoon, and paid respects to Dr Bhaddanta Dhammasami (DPhil. Oxford), an International Missionary monk, and presented offertories to him.
The Senior General and wife and party paid respects to Agga Maha Gandavacaka Pandita Agga Maha Saddhamma Jotikadhaja Maha Dhammakathika Bahujanahitadhara Dr Bhadanta Dhammasami, founder of Shan State Buddhist University Fellow of Oxford University and Rector of International Theravada Buddhist Missionary University. A donation ceremony was opened by reciting namotassa three times; the congregation received the Five Precepts from Sayadaw Dr Bhadanta Dhammasami; and Buddhist monks recited partitas.
The Senior General and wife presented Pitka treatises published in Romanized Language, a replica of Maravijaya Buddha Image, offertories and cash donations to the Sayadaw, who in turn, presented Dhamma books, compiled by him, as the Dharma gift.
The Joint SAC Secretary and SAC members presented donations to the monks. The Sayadaw presented religious books as Dharma gifts.
The congregation led by the Senior General and wife shared the merits gained, and the Sayadaw delivered a sermon.
The Senior General and wife then planted a mahogany as a commemorative tree in the university compound, while the monks recited religious verses and dispensed metal.
Sayadaw Dr Bhaddanta Dhammasami, the founder of Shan State Buddhist University, was born in Nongpan Village, Laikha Township, Shan State, in 1964. At the age of six, he became a novice at the Thiri Mangalar Monastery. He became a monk at 19. He won accolades at Buddhist universities in Myanmar and international Buddhist universities. Oriental Institute, University of Oxford, conferred a doctorate degree on him in 2004. The Venerable Sayadaw visited global countries and carried out missionary work at the international universities and colleges at appropriate time. He commissioned the Shan State Buddhist University on 7 February 2016, and since then, the Venerable monk has been trying to develop the SSBU into a religious institution that can do research or disseminate Buddhism and Dhamma at the international level like its counterparts in Myanmar. Sayadaw Dr Bhaddanta Dhammasami is also compiling and translating and publishing books on promotion and propagation of Buddhism in English, Myanmar and Shan languages in his efforts to serve the interest of the Sasana.
