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Anyone with a 3 or 4 year bachelor鈥檚 degree in any subject or an MSc/MA/MCom/MPhil/MTech/LLM degree or equivalent in any subject is eligible to apply for admission.

PhD students who require funding and who do not have outside funding like a JRF or other fellowship will receive approximately 50,000 INR per month, plus 10,000 house rent allowance. PhD students who avail themselves of Ashoka-managed housing, which is available near campus, will not receive the 10,000 house rent allowance. Tuition fees are as listed in the Ashoka PhD programme guidelines and are approximately 12,500 INR per semester.

Applications must be submitted through . All materials should be submitted through the website, not through email, except as noted below. Applicants must include in the first step of the application process (by uploading through the Ashoka application website):

1. Statement of purpose: A statement approximately 500 words long describing your reasons for pursuing a PhD, the topics you are interested in, and any other information that might be relevant to your application. The statement of purpose can be entered directly into the application or submitted as an attachment in the application. Information about what a good statement of purpose should look like is available .听
2. Writing sample: A piece of philosophical writing at least 4,000 words long and no more than 10,000 words long demonstrating your capacity to make philosophical arguments and analyse philosophical texts. This will typically be a piece of work initially produced for a philosophy class or thesis, and then revised substantially in response to feedback from professors and other philosophy students. It must be your own work, and respect professional (e.g. it should include citations as appropriate). The writing sample must include a word count. The writing sample should be submitted as a separate attachment in the application in the “Other Documents” section. An overview of what a good writing sample should accomplish is available on pages 5-13.
3. Official transcripts of previous degrees (submitted as attachments in application).
4. Names and contact information of 2 professional references willing to speak to your academic potential (submitted in the application as an attachment). Alternatively, have 2 professional letters of recommendation speaking to your academic potential sent by the letter writers themselves. These can be sent by entering the contact information for the letter writers in the application, which will automatically send a request to them for their letters. Letters should be confidential and not shared with the applicant. Additional academic references or letters may be provided if desired. Recommendations will typically be from professors. The list of references can be uploaded in the “Other Documents” section of the application.
5. Academic CV (optional). A discussion about what to include on a CV can be found .

All application materials must be written by the candidate without the use of Large Language Models or other AI tools. All applications must include statements of purpose, writing samples, transcripts, and contact information or letters from recommenders.

Selection is a two step process. The first step is submission of the application. The second step is an online interview with shortlisted applicants. Admitted students will be selected from among the interviewed applicants. All application decisions are made by the Philosophy department.

The deadline for applications for students starting in the 2026-27 academic year is April 15, 2026.

The PhD will last five years. The first two years will consist of coursework with the rest of the time focused on research.

In year 1 and year 2, students enroll in courses. A typical course load is 3 courses (12 credits) per semester.听

Students must satisfy a logic requirement by the end of the first semester by scoring sufficiently high on a logic exam or by getting a B+ or better in PHI-1060: Symbolic Logic. Students who fail to satisfy the requirement can petition the DGS for an extension of up to one semester.

Students must enroll in a proseminar course in the first semester covering Research and Publication Ethics and research methodology.

Students must complete at least 48 credits of coursework. Students must complete at least 8 credits in HW, 8 credits in CC, and 8 credits in IN. Students must complete at least one Metaphysics or Epistemology or Philosophy of Mind course, one Philosophy of Science course, one Ethics or Political Philosophy or Aesthetics course. Students should consult with their SRC about course registration each semester to ensure proper breadth and depth of education. Course requirements can be waived by the DGS.

A minimum GPA of 3.3 is required to advance to candidacy.

Any course not taught by Ashoka Philosophy faculty (visiting or permanent) must be approved by the DGS in order to count towards the degree. Any courses apart from PHI-1060 that are not 5000 level courses must be approved by the DGS in order to count towards the degree.听

Students must pass an oral qualifying exam at the end of the second year.

After the second year students must attend a graduate student seminar each semester where they present work in progress.

In year 3, students work on a qualifying paper in the format of a journal article that they submit and defend at the end of their sixth semester. Students who pass this defence move to the ABD stage at which point they work on their dissertation for the remainder of their time as PhD students.

The dissertation should be a genuine contribution to the field, demonstrating both comprehensive understanding of the literature in the relevant topic, intellectual progress beyond that literature, and skills in philosophy at a level expected of a full member of the profession. The dissertation may take the form of a closely unified monograph of at least 50,000 words, or 3 papers of a form and level appropriate to leading journals in the subfield, combined with an introduction explaining the connections between these papers and how they form a coherent research project. The form of the dissertation should be appropriate to the subfield and agreed with the advisor well in advance of submission.

Beginning in Spring of year 3 or Monsoon of year 4, students will typically spend one semester per year as a teaching fellow for a Philosophy course or an Foundation Course taught by a faculty member in the Philosophy department.

Each student鈥檚 SRC will comprise the advisor (who must be a permanent member of the Philosophy department), the co-advisor (if any), and 2 additional members. Non-advisor members may be from an institution other than Ashoka or departments other than Philosophy. A student鈥檚 SRC will be constituted by the end of the first semester of the third year.

For questions or other information about the Philosophy PhD Programme, contact the Director of Graduate Studies, listed on the Ashoka Philosophy Contact page or email phd.philosophy@ashoka.edu.in.