Bhatkhande Sanskriti Vishwavidyalaya in Lucknow is a specialized state university devoted to Indian music, dance, allied arts, culture and traditional knowledge. Its institutional lineage begins in July 1926, when musicologist Pandit Vishnu Narayan Bhatkhande established Marris College of Hindustani Music with the support of patrons including Rai Umanath Bali, Rai Rajeshwar Bali and Raja Nawab Ali. The founding aim was to place music education within a systematic institutional framework and make structured training available beyond hereditary gharana networks. The institution developed a graded curriculum influenced by Bhatkhande’s work in documenting, classifying and teaching Hindustani classical music. On 26 March 1966, the Government of Uttar Pradesh assumed control of the college and renamed it Bhatkhande College of Hindustani Music. A major status change followed on 24 October 2000, when the Government of India declared the institute a deemed university. In June 2022 it was renamed Bhatkhande Sanskriti Vishwavidyalaya to represent a broader cultural and performing-arts mandate. The university’s academic offerings include degree and diploma study in vocal music, instrumental music, dance and related performing arts. Its educational model combines theory, repertoire, performance practice and the traditional guru-oriented dimensions of Indian arts with formal examinations and university credentials. The Kaiserbagh location places the university within Lucknow’s long-standing musical and cultural landscape. Its alumni include performers, teachers and cultural practitioners who have worked nationally and internationally. The university is particularly distinctive because its history tracks the twentieth-century institutionalization of Indian classical music: from a specialist music college, to a government-controlled institution, to a deemed university, and finally to a state cultural university with a wider remit across performing and allied arts. Its alumni include prominent performers, teachers and cultural practitioners in vocal music, devotional music and allied traditions. Its Lucknow setting continues to connect formal university education with a living classical-music ecosystem.