For some time, professional historians have wondered whether a single, usable, Indian past can any longer be written. The answer has usually been no. The reasons are both academic and political. For one, the past 40 years have seen the welcome burgeoning of histories on relatively unexplored regions, (including the Indian Ocean, or riverine tracts, but also practices and reaches of the subcontinent that remained hidden from mainstream narratives), histories of communities, groups and themes which had long been denied a past (histories of slavery in Kerala or pastoralism, for instance), and of course the rise of critical perspectives (feminist, Dalit, subaltern, environmentalist and so forth) that decisively recast, even re-periodised, well-known historical narratives.
Pilgrims at Bodh Gaya, Bihar. | Photo Credit: special arrangement
Or so we mistakenly believed. Professional historians have of late also been dealing with the political challenge to their practice, as a wide range of ‘custodians’ of the past have emerged, from amateurs, ‘scientists’ and community gatekeepers, to hyper-ethno-nationalists, who lay exclusive claim not only to historical events and figures, but also to how they should be memorialised (or forgotten). There is a frenzied search for ‘heroes and villains’ of Indian history.
Cannons at the Residency, Lucknow, Uttar Pradesh. | Photo Credit: special arrangement
Visual treat
So it is indeed brave (or risky) to announce A New History of India, from its ‘origins’ to the 21st century. Composed in equal part of lavish, high-quality images with excellent explanatory captions, the book is no doubt a visual treat. Given an overall focus on the cultural achievements of each age, and its material remains, the book strives to define anew A.L. Basham’s pioneering work The Wonder that Was India.
Dockyard of the port area of Lothal, 3000–1750 bce, Saurashtra, Gujarat. Today, Lothal is situated more than 15–20 kilometres away from the sea, on the Gulf of Khambhat (historically known as the Gulf of Cambay). | Photo Credit: special arrangement
But the narrative, given the political constraints within which history can at all be discussed in our times, settles for a dated and excessively cautious account of the Indian past. Beginning with the safe reaches of geology and continental formation, the book’s 24 chapters traverse a landscape of well-known landmarks: Harappa, Vedic Society, Ashoka, the Guptas, the Delhi Sultanate, the Mughals, and ends with 11 chapters devoted to the last 300 years. Some gestures are meanwhile made to regional histories.
The bull capital of Rampurva from the Mauryan period, now displayed at the Rashtrapati Bhavan in New Delhi. | Photo Credit: special arrangement
Limited scope
Given the kinds of books that vie for public attention today (and the monstrous proliferation of messaging that implants bizarre new historical ideas in a post-book society), this potted history serves only a limited purpose. For the most part it relies on the exhausted capital of secular anti-colonial nationalism. When majoritarian ethno-nationalist narratives of history today gain disproportionate attention and space, is it enough to retreat to the safer perch of an older framework which at least two generations of historians have done much to subvert?
Church of the Epiphany, Mawlynnong village, Meghalaya. The introduction of Christian literature, music, and English education had a profound effect on the tribal communities in these remote states. The Church of the Epiphany was established in 1902. Its very European architecture makes it stand out in the hilly landscape. | Photo Credit: special arrangement
It would be too easy, even lazy, to produce a laundry list of ‘absences’ in this work. But it is no longer possible to avoid the history of conflict and contention that equally made up the Indian past. Let me take a few examples from the region I know well: did Ramanuja harmlessly transform the Hoysala region through a ‘message [that] was more inclusive’ (p.162) or was there violent conversion of Jain populations and aggrandisement of temples, as most Kannada accounts and evidence amply acknowledge? Was not the medieval period marked by bitter hostility between Shaivas and Vaishnavas, often memorialised in stone? Does Richard Eaton, who is widely cited in this work, not equally point to the place of temple destruction or annexation by all successful regimes, and their political importance? Do Tipu Sultan’s more controversial legacies, related to conversion, require explanation alongside his remarkable zeal for modernisation?
Mural of the Battle of Pollilur in 1780. It offers a wealth of information on battle formations, the composition of the armies with horses, elephants, foot soldiers, the uniforms of the various players, and the military band that accompanied them. The battle scenes are vivid and dramatic, depicting victory and defeat. There are several paintings of Tipu Sultan and his courageous father, Haider Ali, leading their men into battle. | Photo Credit: special arrangement
Were the peasant and tribal revolts of Birsa Munda, Titu Mir, the pushback against Brahminical orthodoxy, (say by Narayana Guru or Periyar), or working class rebellions in vain? From the work of that exemplary historian, Eric Hobsbawm, we have learned that even summative (synthesised) histories can generate blinding insights.
To be fair, despite adhering to conventional political chronology (and dwelling on one region, Bengal, in the modern period), the book draws on economic, social and cultural history in equal part, and deals in a nuanced way with some of the contentious questions that have wracked public discourse (e.g. the transition from the Indus Valley to Vedic Society; the contingent histories of caste mobility throughout the history of the subcontinent; the compulsions behind the religious policy of rulers from Ashoka to Aurangzeb and so on).
Jama Masjid, 17th century, Delhi. | Photo Credit: special arrangement
Other themes in history are dealt with as ‘pop-ups’. A chapter that introduces readers to ‘The Northeast Up to the Coming of British Rule’ begins with the facetious statement that ‘they do things differently there’. Another surprising ‘pop-up’ is the four-page entry on Kamaladevi Chattopadhyay, and her contribution to education, when there is no acknowledgement of feminist historiography elsewhere.
The Dr. Bhau Daji Lad Museum, originally named the Victoria and Albert Museum, opened in 1872 and was the first museum in the city of Bombay. | Photo Credit: special arrangement
While presenting an accessible overview, aided by the richly contextualised images and maps, the New History attempts what is acknowledged, by historians at least, as an impossibility. The much-maligned NCERT History textbooks introduced in 2006 were conceived in an effort to recognise this, and incorporate critical and emerging research in Indian History. They signalled the importance of multiple viewpoints, rich histories beyond nationalist politics (clothing, sport or print culture for instance), and above all the necessity of sharing with young learners a historical method appropriate to our times. A singular history, even when coming from the secular stable, can no longer be the weapon in battling the aggressive surge towards a unified, glorious, majoritarian — and patently untrue — past.
A New History of India: From its Origins to the 21st Century; Rudrangshu Mukherjee, Shobita Punja, Toby Sinclair, Aleph, ₹999.
The reviewer is a retired professor of history, Centre for Historical Studies, Jawaharlal Nehru University.
Published - May 12, 2023 09:01 am IST
