Jaroslav Vacek (26 June 1943 – 23 January 2017) was director of the Institute of South and Central Asia and former dean of the Philosophical Faculty at the Charles University in Prague, where he founded the teaching and research of Mongolian as a new subject.
He was a member of the Czech Oriental Society, the Prague Linguistic Circle, and The Learned Society.
He translated the Bhagavad Gita from Sanskrit into Czech.
Vacek was interested mainly in linguistic problems on the Indian linguistic area and the Dravidian and Altaic relationships, where he applied new research approach.
[1][2] He has been frequently visiting India, especially Hyderabad and Chennai for his research work.