Y. K. Sohoni (1911–2003) was a teacher and professor of French for over fifty years. He was based in Pune and Bombay for most of his life, till he migrated to the United States of America in 1984. In 1953, he started the Indian Association of Teachers of French. He was instrumental in setting up several departments and institutes for the teaching and learning of French in India, and was the first Head of the Department of Modern European Languages at the University of Pune,Wasant Hari Golay, The University of Poona 1949-1974: Silver Jubilee Commemoration Volume (Poona: The Poona University Press, 1974), p. 166. Among other awards, in 1975 he was awarded the Chevalier dans l'Ordre Palmes Académiques by the Government of France "pour services rendus a la culture française."The Times of India, Delhi, 17 June 1975, p. 7. It was in the same year that he established the Department of French in CIEFL, Hyderabad. From 1984, he lived in Great Falls, Virginia till his death in 2003.
