Prof.

Raj Sekhar Basu

[email protected]

Telephone: 91 33 2438 3067 (R)

91 33 97482 76267 (Mobile)

Languages Known : English, Hindi, Bengali and Tamil

Institutional Affiliation: Professor , Department of History, University of Calcutta

Educational Qualifications: M.A. and Ph.D. from the University of Calcutta.

Teaching Experience: More than 25 Years of Teaching experience at PG level

Administrative Experience:

(i) Three years as Treasurer, Indian History Congress (2010-2013)

(ii) Acting Head, Department of History for a period of three months in two spells
(2004 and 2015).
(iii) UGC Expert Nominee to Utkal University.
(iv) ICCR Chair Professor in Indian Studies at Mykola Romeris University, Lithunia
(2011-2014).
EDUCATIONAL QUALIFICATIONS:

Passed B.A. (Hons.) in History, Jadavpur University, 1985,

First Class - First.
Passed M.A. (History), University of Calcutta, 1989, First Class.
Awarded Ph.D. from the University of Calcutta in September 2005. The title of the thesis
was “Socio Cultural Transformation of the Pualayans and Paraiyars of Southern India
1850-1956”. The thesis was supervised by Professor Arun Bandopadhyay, Nurul Hasan
Professor of Modern History, University of Calcutta.

ACADEMIC POSITIONS HELD TILL DATE :

Served as a Lecturer in History, Womens’ Christian College, st August 1991 to March

1993 (on lien vacancy)
Served as a Lecturer in the Department of History, Rabindra Bharati University, Kolkata,
March 1993- January 2004.

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Promoted to the rank of Senior Lecturer in August 1998
Appointed as Lecturer in the Department of History, University of Calcutta November
2003.
Joined as Lecturer in the Department of History, University of Calcutta, January 28,
2004.
Promoted to the rank of a Reader in the Department of History from September 26, 2005.
ICCR Visiting Professor in Contemporary Indian Studies, Mykolo Romeris University,
Lithuania, November 2011—June 2014.
Served as Associate Professor, Department of History from June 2014 till September
30,2015.
Served as Associate Professor in the Centre for the Study of Discrimination and
Exclusion, School of Social Sciences, Jawaharlal Nehru University, New Delhi , October
2015, to September 27, 2o16.
Re joined the University of Calcutta as Associate Professor, Department of History ,
University of Calcutta , 28.09.2016.

Teaching Experience:

Taught for more than ten years in the Under Graduate and Post Graduate courses offered
by the Department of History, Rabindra Bharati University, Kolkata. In the Under
Graduate level, the teaching load was centred around the course of Modern India, 1857 –
1947, covering the rise of modern political associations, racist overtones of British
policies, shifts in British economic policies, the occurrences of rural distress, the impact
of revenue policies in different parts of India, the emergence of the Indian National
Congress, the period of popular protests, militancy and revolutionary terrorism, the
Congress as a mass organization and its role in mass movements – Non Cooperation and
Civil Disobedience Movements, the politics of divide and rule and its implications on
Hindu – Muslim relations, the Communal Award and the growing seeds of
disenchantment, the Government of India Act of 1935 and its implications on electoral
politics, the Second World War and the nationalist movement, Quit India Movement as a
symbol of peoples’ movement, Communist led mass movements, the communal
disturbances in Bengal, United Provinces, Punjab and the North – West Frontier
Provinces, the partition of India and its impact on South Asian politics.

In the Post Graduate level, the emphasis was more on British revenue experiments
in the early nineteenth century, the institution of bondage, the cause of the famine of
1876, the industrial policy of the colonial state and agriculture, irrigation development
and stratifications in the peasant societies.

In the University of Calcutta, where I am presently teaching a course on Modern

India, the emphasis is on Caste Politics of the 1920s and 1930s, the growth of working
class consciousness and low issues of caste, sect and religious issues are interwoven with
it, the nature of Muslim politics following the Government of India Act of 1935, the Quit

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India Movement – debates as to whether it was essentially an autonomous movement or
whether it was a movement which had been organized by the Congress, but later taken on
by the masses, the issue of partition and the new understandings of it based on literature,
oral evidences and memories.

I had been teaching for seven years a course on social history of Modern India which
involved discussion on issues of colonial ethnography, caste system, caste consciousness
and identity, lower caste politics and nationalism. I had also taught a course on business
history involving the two principal trading communities, the Parsis and the Marwaris in
the nineteenth century.

In the Mykolo Romeris University, am teaching two courses entitled Journey from Pre
History to Medieval India and Transition from Mughal rule to English . In the first
course, I essentially deal with prehistory, the links between territory and inhabitants,
movement of people , the debate on the Aryans, the importance of religious texts, the
emergence of Jainism and Buddhism, the state systems in early India, the economic
institutions, the Mauryan rule, the decline of the Mauryas, the rule of the Indo Greeks, the
rise of the Indo Greeks, the debate on caste,the emergence of feudalism, the Gupta
empire, the later Guptas, the Mukharis, the Rajput debate, the bhakti movement, the
beginning of Turkish rule, the administration of the Khiljis, the Tughluq rulers, the
beginning of composite culture, the military campaigns of Babur, the reign of Akbar,
Jahangir, Shah Jahan and Aurangzeb, the mansabdari system, the jagirdari system, the
cultural achievements of the Mughals, the decline of the Mughals.

In the second course, I discuss the issues related to the political developments in
eighteenth century, the rival powers in India, the political aspirations of the Marathas, the
emergence of regional powers, the rivalries between the English and the French in South
India, the relations between the Nawabs of Bengal and the English, the battle of Plassey,
the administrative changes brought by the East India Company, the Permanent
Settlement, Ryotwari and Mahalwari Settlements, the defeat of Mysore and the Maratha
rulers, the impact of Bentinck’s reforms, the dissatisfaction of the natives, the Revolt of
1857, the crushing of the revolt, the beginning of the Pax Brittanica, the middle class
associations and the emergence of the Indian National Congress, the partition of Bengal,
the differences between the moderates and the extremists, the first world war and its
impact on India, the emergence of Gandhi, the age of mass politics, many voices of
nationalism, peasant and working class protests, popular movements in the 1940s and the
partition of India.

In the Centre for the Study of Discrimination and Exclusion, School of Social Sciences,
JNU, taught courses on core paper dealing with rural history and history of marginalised
communities and also taught themes related to ethnicity and exclusion in the global
context.

MEMBERSHIP OF ACADEMIC BODIES:

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Member of the Indian History Congress.
Member of the Asiatic Society, Calcutta.
Member of the Calcutta Historical Society.

EDITORIAL BOARD MEMBER IN JOURNAL:

i. Editorial Board Member of the Archiv Orientali, journal published by the Czech
Academy, Prague.
ii. Editorial Board Member of the Acta Orientalica, journal published by the
Centre for Oriental Studies, Vilnius University.
iii.Editorial Board Member, The International Journal of Area Studies, Vytautas
Magnus University, Kaunas.
FELLOWSHIPS HELD SO FAR:

i) Received the Rotary Fellowship in 1995 to work in Brazil and the

United States of America.
ii) Received the Shastri Indo-Canadian Institute Fellowship 2000.
iii) Selected for the Shastri Indo-Canadian Fellowship in 2009.

GRANTS HELD SO FAR:

i) Received the Wellcome Trust Travelling Grant in2002.

ii) Received a Fulbright Grant to attend the Fulbright Seminar
Programme in the United States in 2003.
iii) Received Charles Wallace India Trust Grants in 2006.
iv) Received Wellcome Trust Travelling Grant in 2006.

VISITING PROFESSORSHIPS HELD SO FAR:

Visiting Professor, Mykolo Romeris University, Vilnius, funded by April 3- April 17,
2016, funded by the Lithuania Science Council.
Served as ICCR Visiting Professor in Mykolo Romeris University, Vilnius,
November 2011—June 2014
Visiting Professor in the Department of History, Uppsala University, 2011
Visiting Professor in the Department of History, Osmania University, Hyderabad 2009

Visiting Professor in the Centre for Ambedkar Studies, Utkal University,

Bhubaneswar, 2008.

Visiting Professor in the Centre for Historical Studies, Jawaharlal Nehr University,
Delhi, 2007

Visiting Professor in the Faculty of Arts, Uppsala University 2006

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Visiting Faculty to the Diparitimento Istituto Italiano di Studi Orientali during the period
7-23 September 2016.

Adjunct Professor in The Indian Institute of Management , October 17, 2016.

Resource person in Refresher Courses :

Served as a resource person in the Refresher Course in History, Osmania University in

2008 and 2010.

Resource Person at international workshop on Rural India: Change, Institution and

Identities, organised by the University of Calcutta and the University of Rome, La
Sapienza University of Calcutta., September 11-12, 2006 at the Centre for Social Studies
and Humanities,

Resource Person in Extension lectures:

Served as a Resource Person for students in M. Phil course in Rabindra Bharati

University, 2010.

Organising Refresher Courses:

Served as Joint Coordinator of Refresher Course on " Writing Social History: Past
Perceptions and Contemporay Concerns", Department of History, University of Calcutta,
January 28 to February 19, 2009.

Organising Seminars :

Was the coordinator of the special panel on Dalit History and Identity in the Indian
History Congress, 2009, on behalf of the Institute of Development Studies.

Was the Joint Coordinator for a seminar on a theme Invoking Ambedkar on behalf of the
Institute of Development Studies, Kolkata, 2010.

Had been the joint coordinator for the seminar Dalits and Adivasis in India, organised
by the Department of History, University of Calcutta, March 22-23, 2007.

Special Honours :

Was elected the Sectional President in the Modern Indian History Section of the Indian
History Congress, 2013.

Presentation in National And International Seminars :

1. The paper entitled, “Ambedkar and his ideas on Marxism and Buddhism” was
presented at the Centre for Discrimination and Social Exclusion, Jawharlal Nehru
University, February 2014

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2. The paper entitled, “Caste, Class and Consciousness: Some Observations on the
Movements of the Pulayas in the Princely States of Travancore and Cochin in the
Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries” in the conference “The Caste Question and
the Historian’s Craft”, organized by the Centre for the Study of Developing
Societies, Delhi, February, 2014.
3. The paper entitled, “Understanding Hinduism in Fiji” presented at the CEIAS,
Paris, January 23, 2014.
4. The paper entitled, “Bhojpuri Folk Traditions in Understanding the Girmitya
Experience in Fiji” presented at the Centre for Pacific Studies, University of
Marseilles, January 24, 2014.
5. Delivered the address of the Sectional President, Modern India History Section,
Indian History Congress, entitled “Recapturing the Moments of Dalit History and
Politics: A Journey from Colonial to the Post Colonial” Ravenshaw University,
Cuttack, December 2013.
6. The paper entitled, “Comparing the Black Atlantic Slave Trade of the Eighteenth
Century with the Indentured Labour Migration of the Nineteenth Century”, Aligarh
Historians Society Panel, Indian History Congress, Cuttack, December 2013.
7. The paper entitled, “Exploring the origins of the Girmitya System in late
Nineteenth Century Fiji : The tale of Expectation and Exploitation” South Asian
Institute, Hiedelberg, July 9, 2013.
8. The paper entititled “ Ambedkar and his perceptions of Karl Marx and Buddha” ,
presented in the Department of Sociology, Lund University, February 27, 2013.

9. The paper entitled “ Congress and the Poverty Amelioration Programmes: The
Narrative from the Nehru Gandhi Years” presented at the European Institute of
Asian Studies, Brussels, February 21, 2013.

10. The paper entitled “ Interpreting Lower Caste Movements in Colonial India”
presented at the Institute of South and Central Asia, Charles University, Prague,
December 6, 2012

11. The paper entitled “ Caste and Untouchability: The links between history,
present and living experience”, presented at the Faculty of Oriental Studies, Tartu
University, December 14, 2012.

12. The paper entitled “ Understanding Karl Marx and Buddha through Ambedkar’s
lens”, presented at the Faculty of Oriental Studies, Tartu University, December 13,
2012.

13. The paper entitled" Indian History and Modernity" presented at the Mykolo
Romeris University, October 11, 2012.

14. The paper entitled" Colonial Ethnography and the issue of Caste in India",
presented in a seminar organised by the Department of Anthropology, Vytautus
Magnus University, Kaunas, March 15, 2012.

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15. " Debating the commonalities and differences between Atlantic Black Slave Trade
and Indentured Labour Migration in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries",
Conference on Slavery, Indentured Labour Migration, Diaspora and Identity
Formation, June 19-23, 2018, Paramaribo, Suriname. This was funded by the
Indian Council of Cultural Relations, as part of the government entourage in
connection with the visit of the President of India to the Republic of Suriname.

16. '' Moving Beyond Academic Writings on the Marginalised: Could Viramma be an
example" New Paradigms for Oriental Studies, September 6, 2019, Czech
Academy of Sciences, Prague. This was an invited lecture funded by the Czech
Academy of Sciences.

17. The paper entitled "Visveswaraya and Town Planning in Twentieth Century
Hyderabad" presented at the Aligarh Historians Society Panel, Indian History
Congress, December 2011.

18. The paper entitled" Government , Missionaries, Non Government Organisations

and Health Issues in early twentieth century Travancore", presented at a research
symposium on Health and Medicine in Princely India, August 30-31, 2011,
organised by the Oxford Brookes University, Delhi. The paper will be edited by
Arun Bandopadhyay for a felicitation volume for Prof. Benoy Bhushan Chaudhuri.

19. The paper entitled" Understanding Karl Marx and Buddha through Ambedkar's
Lens", Faculty Seminar, Uppsala, May 10, 2011.

20. The paper entitled" Healing the Sick and the Destitute: Protestant Missions in
the Princely State of Travancore", presented at the two day conference on Health
and Healing Practices in Colonial India: Continuity and Changes, NMML, March
24-25, 2011, Delhi. The article has been accepted for publication in a volume being
edited by Madhuri Sharma and Dhrub Kumar Singh.

21. The paper entitled " Adi Dravida Politics in Twentieth Century Tamilnadu"
presented at the Aligarh Historians Society Panel, Indian History Congress,
February 6, 2011. The article was published in Social Scientist , 2011

22. The paper entitled," The Missionary Involvement with slave castes in late
nineteenth century Travancore" presented at a seminar on a theme entitled
Minorities and Margins: Colonial Encounter and Post Colonial Discourses,
organised by the Programme for Social Exclusion and Discrimination,
JNU,February 17-18, 2011, Delhi.

23. The paper entitled " The Christianisation of the Saoras in Ganjam " presented at
the Mcmaster Divinity College, February, 25, 2010.

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24. The paper entitled" Congress and the anti-poverty measures: The narratives
from the Jawaharlal Nehru and Indira Gandhi Years" presented at the seminar,
“The 125 years of the Congress”, organised by JNIAS, July7-8, 2009. The paper
was published in the journal Societal Studies, published by Mykolo Romeris
University, 2012.

25. The paper entitled" Exploring the debate on the eighteenth century history of the
Pariahs in South India" presented in Aligarh Historians Society Panel, Indian
History Congress, May 2009. The paper was published in a volume edited by
Shirin Moosvi entitled Capitalism, Colonialism and Globalization: Studies in
Economic Change, Tulika, 2011.

26. The paper entitled “Interpreting Dalit Movements in India" , presented at the
Centre for Ambedkar Studies, Utkal University, July 10, 2008, Bhubaneswar.

27. .Delivered a lecture on Adi Dravida Perceptions of the Revolt of 1857" presented at
the Berhampore College, Murshidabad, January 17, 2008.

28. The paper entitled" The Revolt of 1857: The "Lower Caste " Narratives in
Tamilnadu", presented at the seminar organised by the Department of History,
Vidyasagar University and the ICHR, December 4-5, 2007, Midnapur

29. The paper entitled, " The Overseas Migration of the Tamil " Lower Castes" in the
nineteenth and twentieth centuries" , presented at the seminar organised by
Department of History, University of Calcutta, March 22-23, 2007. The article had
been published in a volume entitled Narrtives of the Excluded : Castes in Colonial
India, KP Bagchi, Kolkata 2009.

30. The paper entitled " Caste, Class and Migration: The Tamil " Lower Caste"
Experiences in the Overseas in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries", presented at
the seminar organised by the Indian Institute of Advanced Studies and Maulana
Abul Kalam Azad Institute of Asian Studies, March 28-29, 2006, Kolkata. The
paper was published jointly with Jayanta Kumar Ray in a volume, published by
Debi Prasad Chattopadhyay on behalf of the Centre for Indian Civilization, Delhi ,
through Pearson Press, Delhi, 2009.

31. 30. The paper entitled " The Panchama Land Issue in Nineteenth Century
Tamilnadu", presented at the conference on the Environmental History of Asia,
organised by the University of Sussex and the Zakir Hussain Centre for
Educational Research, JNU, December 4-7, 2002. The paper was published in
Studies in History ,2008

32. The paper entitled" Interpreting Lower Caste Movements in Colonial India",
Faculty Seminar, Uppsala University, November 15, 2006.

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 33. The paper entitled “Hinduism in Fiji ; An Act of Reconstruction or Reconstitution
presented at the seminar on Hinduism in Fiji, organised by John Cabot University
Rome September 12, 2012.

34. Presented a paper entitled ‘ The journey of Dalit History and Politics : Instances
from the past and present.’ in a seminar on Dalit Politics in India, organised by the
Faculty of Oriental Studies, La, Sapienza, Rome on September , 20, 2016.

35. Delivered a lecture on Suniti Kumar Chatterjee and the Baltic ; An Attempt to
rediscover the connectivities between people and culture , Centre of Oriental
Studies Vilinius University April 13, 2014.

36. Delivered a lecture on Understanding Hinduism in Fiji , organised by CEIAS ,

Paris January 2014.

37. Delivered a lecture on Congress and Poverty Alleviation Programmes Nehru and
Gandhi Years Poverty Alleviation in India, organised by EIAS Briefing Seminar
February 21, 2013, EIAS Brussels.

38. Conference on Slavery, Indentured Labour, Migration, Diaspora and Identity

Formation organised by IGSR, University Campus, Paramaribo, Suriname,June 18-
June 23, 2019, paper presentation titled," Comparing Black Alantic Slavery of the
Eighteenth Century with the Indentured Labour Migration in the Nineteenth
Century".

39. Conference on the 90th year of the founding of the Archiv Orientalni in
Prague,September 5-6, 2019. Paper presentation titled, "In the quest for a Different
World: Viramma and the Depictions of Dalit Womanhood".
40. " Gandhi and the Indentured Labour Question in the Pacific: The Fijian Story",
Gandhi and the World, Indian Council for World Affairs, October 1-2, 2020, New
Delhi.

MONOGRAPHS

1. Nandanar’s Children: The Paraiyar’s Tryst with Destiny, Tamilnadu 1850-1956

published in 2011 by Sage, New Delhi .
2. Different Aspects of Dalit Experiences in Colonial and Post Colonial India, Rajat
Publications, Delhi, 2010.

BOOKS EDITED

Co-edited with Sanjukta Dasgupta a collection of essays on Dalit social and political
experiences in colonial India. The title of the monograph is Narratives of the Excluded:
Caste Issues in Colonial India, published by K.P. Bagchi and Co., Kolkata, 2008.

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 1. Co-edited with Sanjukta Dasgupta , Narratives from the Margins : Aspects of
Adivasi History in India, Primus, New Delhi, 2011.

2. Co-edited with Deepak Kumar, Medical Encounters in British India, Oxford

University Press, 2013

3. Co-edited with Chinna Rao, Understanding Edgar Thurston and the Colonial
Ethnography in South India. This book will be published by leading Indian
publisher based in Delhi in 2015.

Other Academic Publications:

a) Articles published in reviewed national and international journals.

1) “Punjab Studies now and then: A Quest for Newer and Richer Experience” in
Punjab Journal of Politics, 1994.
2) “Medical Missionaries in a Native Indian State: The Case of the LMS in
Travancore, 1866 – 1950”, Bengal Past and Present, Vol.121, Nos. 232-233,
2002, Parts I – II.

3) “Congress, Gandhi and Politics of Untouchability in Tamilnadu in the Early

1930s” in Indian Historical Review, Vol. XXX, Nos. 1 and 2, (January and July
2003).
4) “The Emancipation of the Pulayas in Nineteenth Century Kerala”, Social Science
Probings, Vol. 17, No. 1. June 2005
5) “Canadian Perceptions and Policies Towards India: 1945- 2001”, Punjab Journal
of Politics, Vol. XXVIII, No. 1, January – June 2004.
6) “Investigating the Paraiyans’ Right over ‘Waste’: The Tussle between the
Reformist and Conservative Bureaucracy in late Nineteenth Century Tamil
Nadu”, Contemporary India, Vol. 3 No. 3, July – September 2004.
7) “Reinterpreting Dalit Movements in India” in Indian Historical Review 2006.
8) “ Dalit Politics in Tamilnadu” in Seminar,February,2006
9) “Exploring the lost vision of Dravidanadu: Political Rivalry and the Crisis of Adi
Dravida Politics in Tamil Nadu, 1947 – 1956” in Contemporary India, July –
September, 2006
10) “Re-exploring the Issue of the Emancipation of the Pulayas in Nineteenth Century
Kerala” in the history journal of ICFAI, Hyderabad, 2008.
11) “The Quest for new homes and new lives: The overseas migration patterns of
Tamil untouchables in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries” in
Contemporary Perspectives, Vol. 2, No. 1 January-June 2008.
12) ‘Rights over Wastelands’ and New Narratives of the Paraiyan Past (1860 – 1900),
published in Studies in History, 2009.

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 13) “Land Rights of the Paraiyars: A Critique of the ‘Golden Age of the Pariah’ in
Eighteenth Century Tamilnadu would be published soon by the Department of
History, University of Tokyo in its web journal.
14) “The Making of Adi Dravida Politics in early Twentieth Century Tamilnadu” in
Social Scientist.2011
15) “Understanding the Poverty Amelioration Programmes of the Congress: The
Narratives from the Jawaharlal Nehru and Indira Gandhi Years”, Societal Studies,
Mykolo Romerio University,4(2),2012.

16) “Higher Education and Participation of Indigenous People in India : Some

reflections” in Societal Studies, 5(2), 2013. (Jointly with K.M. Joshi)
17) Missionaries, Non State Agencies and Health Issues in Travancore in the
Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries”, History and Sociology of South Asia, (9),
2015.
18) " Towards An Exercise in Unravelling the Hidden Sides of Commonalities and
Differences : Black Atlantic Slave Trade and Indentured Labour Migration",
Vidyasagar University Journal of History, Vol. VI, 2017-2018 , published in
2018.
19) " Bhojpuri folk songs of Indians in Fiji", Studies in People's History, Vol.5,Issue
I, 2018.
20) " Controversies over Sikh Involvement in Alien Terrain: Turbulence in Punjab,
Gandhi Sikh Discord and the Uneasiness in Vaikom, 1924-1925", Archiv
Orientalni, 87/3, 2019.
21) " In the Quest for a Different World: Viramma and the Depictions of Dalit
Womanhood", Contemporary Voice of Dalit, Volume 12, Issue I, 2020.

b)Articles published in non-refereed national journals.

1) “Gandhi, Akalis and Vaikam Satyagraha: The Beginning of an Unhappy Saga” in

Journal of Sikh History, 2000.
2)
3) “The Buckingham and Carnatic Mills Strike and the Cracks in Non Brahmin
Polity in early Twentieth Century South India”, The Calcutta Historical Journal,
Vols. XXIII & XIV (Combined) 2001- 2004.

b) Articles published in edited books published by leading national publishers.

1) “Caste, Pollution and Politics of Untouchability in Early Twentieth Century

Punjab” in Ranjit Kumar Roy (ed.) Imperial Embrace: Essays in Honour of Sunil
Kumar Sen, Engage, Calcutta, 1993.
2) “A Critique of Gandhi’s Varnashramadharma” in Amitabha Mukherjee (ed.)
Gandhi Yesterday and Today, Institute of Historical Studies, 1995.

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3) “Babu Radhanath Basu Mullick and his times” in Ranjit Kumar Roy (ed.) Bengal
in the Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries, Progressive Publishers, 1996.
4) “Christianisation of Paraiyans in Tamilnadu : Some Preliminary Observations” in
Roger E. Hedlund (ed.) Christianity in India : Issues and Prospects, ISPCK, New
Delhi, 2000.
5) “Medical Missionaries at Work: The Canadian Baptist Missionaries in the Telugu
Country 1870 – 1952” in Deepak Kumar (ed.) Disease and Medicine in India: A
Historical Overview, Tulika, New Delhi, 2001.
6) “Search for Fresh Pastures: Tamil Migration to Malayan Plantations in the
Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries” in Lipi Ghosh and Ramkrishna Chatterjee
(eds.) Indian Diaspora in Asian and Pacific Regions: Culture, People,
Interactions, Rawat Publications, New Delhi, 2004.
7) Contributed to the introduction jointly with Sanjukta Das Gupta for the book titled
Narratives of the Excluded: Caste Issues in Colonial India, published by K.P.
Bagchi and Co., Kolkata, 2008.
8) “Exploring the World of an Engineer: Sir M. Visvesvaraya and Irrigation
Engineering in early Twentieth Century India” in Arun Bandopadhyay (ed.)
Science and Society in India: 1750-2000, Manohar, 2009.
9) “Marginal Groups and Watershed Programmes in Contemporary South India :
The Case Study of Andhra Pradesh” in Arun Bandopadhyay (ed.) Nature,
Knowledge and Development : Critical Essays on the Environmental History of
India ,Primus Books, 2016.
10) “Exploring the Issue of Indo-Malaysian Identity: The Tamil Experience in
Malaysia” in Sucharita Chattopadhyay (ed.), Critical Essays on South East Asian
Studies, Worldview Publications, New Delhi, 2009.
11) “Exploring the links between South Indian Folklore and the Colonial
Ethnography: Edgar Thurston’s Study of the Tamil Paraiyar in the Nineteenth
Century” in Raj Sekhar Basu and Chinna Rao Yagati (eds.), Understanding Edgar
Thurston and the Colonial Ethnography in South India. This book will be
published by a leading Indian publisher based in Delhi.

c) Articles and chapters contributed to edited books published by the leading

international publishers.

1) “Missionaries in the Guise of Physicians: Case studies of the Canadian Baptists

and London Missionary Society Medical Missions in late 19th and early 20th
century South-India” in Ian M. Randall and Anthony R. Cross (eds.) Baptists and
Mission: Papers from the 4th international Conference on Baptists Studies,
Published by Paternoster, United Kingdom, 2007.
2) “Entrapped between Bondage and Freedom: Paraiyans and the Changing Fortunes
of Agrestic Servitude in Colonial and Post-Colonial Tamilnadu” in Jan Breman,
Isabelle Guerin and Aseem Prakash (eds.), India’s Unfree Workforce, Oxford
University Press, 2009.
3) “‘Disquiet’ in Mid Nineteenth Century Tamilnadu and the Adi Dravida
Interpretations of the Impact of the Revolt of 1857” in Biswamoy Pati (ed.), The
Great Revolt of 1857, Routledge, London, 2009.

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4) “The Migration of the Tamil Lower Castes to the Overseas Settlements in the
Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries”, (contributed jointly with Jayanta Kumar
Ray) in Jayanta Kumar Ray (ed.), Indian Diaspora: Lessons from History and
Contemporary Politics, Pearson Longmans, New Delhi, 2009.
5) “Indians in Fiji”, (contributed jointly with Jayanta Ray) in Jayanta Kumar Ray
(ed.), Indian Diaspora: Lessons from History and Contemporary Politics, Pearson
Longmans, New Delhi, 2009.
6) “The Conflicting Opinion of the Colonial Bureaucracy over the Paraiyans Right
over ‘Waste’ in Late Nineteenth Century Tamil Nadu” in Elisabetta Basile &
Ishita Mukhopadhyay (eds.) The Changing Identity of Rural India : A Socio-
Historic Analysis, Anthem South Asian Studies, New Delhi, 2009.
7) “Discovering the Lost Voices of Adi Dravida History: The Experiences of the
Early 1920s” in Rila Mukherjee and M. Srinivas (eds.), Locality, Memory and
History, Cambridge Scholars Publishing, Cambridge, 2009.
8) “Healing the Sick and the Destitute: Protestant Missionaries and Medical
Missions in nineteenth and twentieth century Travancore” in Medical
Encounters in British India jointly edited with Deepak Kumar published by the
Oxford University Press in 2013.
9) “The Golden Age of the Pariah: The Myth or Reality in Eighteenth Century
Tamilnadu” in Shirin Moosvi(ed.) Capitalism, Colonialism and Globalisation:
Studies in Economic Change, Tulika, Delhi, 2011.
10) “Caught between Disease and Mortality: The Experiences of the Indian Migrant
Labourers in Burma and Malaya in the late nineteenth and early twentieth
centuries” in Lipi Ghosh (ed.)Eastern Indian Ocean: Historical Links to
Contemporary Convergences, Cambridge Scholars Publishing, 2011.
11) Contributed to the introduction of the book , Medical Encounters in British India
jointly edited with Deepak Kumar, published by the Oxford University
Press,2013..
12) " Reconstitution or Reconfiguration: The complexities of Hinduism in Fiji" in
Arun Bandyopadhyay and Sanjukta Das Gupta (eds.) In the Quest of the
Historian's Craft :Essays in honour of Professor B B Chaudhuri,Part - II : The
Polity, Society and Culture, Manohar, Delhi, 2018.
13) Faced with an uphill task ; Police and crime control in Calcutta , 1780-1950 in
Sabyasachi Bhattacharya ed. Comprehensive History of Modern Bengal, Vol. 3
Primus , New Delhi 2020 . ( forthcoming)
14) Alterity , Migration and diaspora ; The Indo Fijian Experience in the Pacific
accepted in the first round of evaluation for publication in the journal
Purusartha.
15) Contesting claims over the past: Differing perceptions of the elite and Dalit
Historians in India" in Sanjukta Das Gupta and Amit Prakash (eds.) Decentering
Dominant Narratives in India: Alternative Perceptions of History and
Development, Rivista Degli Studi Orientali, Pisa- Roma, 2018.

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 d) Chapters contributed to jointly edited books published by leading national
publishers.

Contributed to the introduction jointly with Sanjukta Das Gupta for the book titled
Narratives of the Excluded: Caste Issues in Colonial India, published by K.P. Bagchi and
Co., Kolkata, 2008.

“Exploring the links between South Indian Folklore and the Colonial Ethnography, Edgar
Thurston’s Study of the Tamil Paraiyar in the Nineteenth Century” in Raj Sekhar Basu
and Chinna Rao Yagati (eds.), Understanding Edgar Thurston and the Colonial
Ethnography in South India. This book will be published by a leading Indian publisher
based in Delhi.

BOOK REVIEWS

Book Reviews have been published in Gandhi Marg, Soccer and Society, Indian
Historical Review, International Journal for the History of Sports. Book Reviews have
also been published in Studies in History and Social Scientist and Book Review and
Economic and Political Weekly.

ENCYCLOPEDIA ENTRIES

1. Entries on caste, depressed class politics and untouchability have been published
in the Banglapaedia, published by the Asiatic Society of Bangladesh, Dhaka.
2. Entries on Mauritius, Lingayats and Islamic Law have been published in the
Encyclopaedia an Asia, published by the Berkshire Publishing Company, United
States.
3. Co authored with Sudarshana Bhaumik) "Dharma Mangal Kavya of the
Mangalkavya Genre in Natalie Kuoma, Eric P. Meyer and Anne
Viguer(eds.)Encyclopedie Des Historiographies: Afriques, Ameriques, Asies,
Inalco Presses, Paris, 2020.

EXPERIENCE OF RESEARCH GUIDANCE AT THE M.PHIL LEVEL.

1) Smt. Tina Basu was awarded the M.Phil. degree in History by the
University of Calcutta in 2008. Her M.Phil. dissertation was entitled,
“The History of the Damodar Valley Corporation in Bengal”.
2) Smt. Sujata Podder was awarded the M.Phil. degree in History, by the
University of Calcutta in 2009. Her M.Phil. dissertation was entitled
“The Cultural Life of North Calcutta in the Nineteenth Century”.

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 3) Smt . Dipanwita Majumder was awarded the M. Phil degree in
History by the University of Calcutta in 2014. Her M. Phil dissertation
was entitled” Indian Diaspora in the United Kingdom”.
4) Ayan Kundu Appropriating the advasis into the Hindu Fold : The idea
of ‘Hindu Bhavan,’ in Eastern India,’ in 2019.

EXPERIENCE OF RESEARCH GUIDANCE AT THE PH.D LEVEL.

1) Ph.D. degree was granted by Rabindra Bharati University, Calcutta to

Shri Apurba Chakrabarty in 2003, who, under my supervision had
submitted his dissertation entitled, “Exploring the Historiography of
Labour in Colonial and Post Colonial India” for the award of the said
degree.
2) Ph.D. degree was granted by Rabindra Bharati University, Calcutta to
Shri Subrata Kumar Pahari in 2005, who, under my supervision had
submitted his dissertation entitled “The Dawn Society and its
Contribution to Education in Early Twentieth Century Bengal” for the
award of the said degree.
3) Ph. D degree was awarded to Jahan Ali Purkait by the Rabindra Bharati
University under the joint supervision of me and Dr. Hitendra Kumar
Patel for the dissertation entitled” Unani Medicine in Colonial Bengal”
in 2014.
4) Shri Manas Dutta has submitted and awarded his Ph.D under my
supervision in the Department of History, University of Calcutta. His
Ph.D. dissertation is entitled, “A Study of the Social Composition and
Organization of the Madras Army c.1807 -1885.”
5) Supervised Gautam Bhagat jointly with Shereen Mondal on a theme
titled” The changing contours of railway technology ; the varied
aspects of railway engineering in colonial India,” in 2018.
6) Ms. Sudarshana Bhaumik has submitted and awarded Ph.D degree on
a theme titled “ Reinterpreting caste and Hierarchy in Bengal ,
Mangalkavyas as a counter narrative, c. 1700-1931,” under the joint
supervision of Prof. Y. Chinna Rao and myself from the Centre for the
Study of Discrimination and Exclusion , School of Social Sciences,
Jawaharlal Nehru University , New Delhi in December 2018.

EXAMINER OF M.PHIL. DISSERTATIONS:

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 Examined more than four M.Phil. dissertations of the Burdwan University, Rabindra
Bharati University and Jawaharlal Nehru University and Delhi University.

EXAMINER OF PH.D. DISSERTATIONS:

Examined Ph.D. dissertations of Madras University, Jawaharlal Nehru University and

Vytautas Magnus University, Guhawati, Jadavpur University.

PROJECTS;
Principal investigator of the External Project entitled “ Recovering the History of an
underprivileged group: The Varied Experiences of the Pulayas in the Nineteenth and
Twentieth Century Kerela,” under the Asiatic Society , Kolkata ( ongoing)
Health , Labour and Migration in the antipodes in collaboration with Dr . Jane
Buckingham , University of Canterbury , funded by India New Zealand Educational
Council ( Continuing )
Book project with Tiasa Basu Roy , on a theme titled Christianisation of the Savaras ;The
Canadian Baptists involvement in rural southern Odisha, 1870-1950( Manuscript would
be ready July 2020)
Working on a joint article with Sudarshana Bhaumik based on the ICHR funded project
titled “ Sports , Politics and Identity Mohameddan Sporting and the Uran Milieu of
Calcutta 1934-1939. The article would be submitted for publication in an international
journal in December 2020.
Worked as co – investigator, on the Research Project of Indian Institute of Dalit Studies,
titled ‘Land and Property Rights in Modern India’ with Prof. Y Chinna Rao (
Chairperson, Centre for the Study of Discrimination and Exclusion, School of Social
Sciences, JNU)
Working as the principal investigator in the ongoing DPO/289/UPE II project under
Dept. of History , University of Calcutta , titled “ India’s Maritime Relation – Trade and
Culture with the South Asian countries- the Past , Ancient and Modern and the Prospects,

Other relevant contributions:

Prepared study materials for the MA Programme in History organised by the
IGNOU, Delhi.
Has served as a paper setter and examiner in the SET Examination organised by the
College Service Commission , West Bengal.
Has served as a paper setter for the General Studies paper of the WBCS Preliminary
Examination 2015 organised by the West Bengal Public Service Commission.
Unit writing of the Certificate Programme on Life and thought of B.R Ambedkar ,
School of Social Sciences , Faculty of Sociology submitted in August 2016 along with

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Neha Singh , M Phil Scholar in the Centre for the Study of Discrimination and Exclusion
, School of Social Sciences , Jawaharlal Nehru University .

Guest Speaker in radio and television :

Has been a guest speaker for the Gnana Bani, All India Radio, Kolkata,
Doordarshan Kendra, Kolkata and the Voice of America. Has also been a narrator on a
theme related to crime and criminality in nineteenth century India for a TV Company
based in Mumbai.

Kolkata (India)
Date: 09.10. 2019 (Raj Sekhar Basu)

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