He started his literary career with Maithili poems by the pen-name of Yatri (यात्री) in the early 1930s. By the mid 1930s, he started writing poetry in Hindi. His first permanent job of a full-time teacher, took him to Saharanpur (Uttar Pradesh), though he didn't stay there for long as his urge to delve deeper into Buddhist scriptures, took him to the Buddhist monastery at Kelaniya, Sri Lanka, where in 1935, he became a Buddhist monk, entered the monastery and studied the scriptures, just as his mentor, Rahul Sankrityayan had done earlier, and hence took upon the name "Nagarjun". While at the monastery, he also studied Leninism and Marxism ideologies, before returning to India in 1938 to join 'Summer School of Politics' organised by noted peasant leader, Sahajanand Saraswati, founder of Kisan Sabha. A wanderer by nature, Nagarjun spent a considerable amount of his time in the 1930s and the 1940s travelling across India.