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{{Short description|Director-General of Anthropological Survey of India}}
{{EngvarB|date=September 2014}}
{{Use dmy dates|date=September 2014}}
'''Kumar Suresh Singh''' (1935–2006) commonly known as '''K. S. Singh''', was an [[Indian Administrative Service]] officer, who served as a Commissioner of Chotanagpur (1978–80) and Director-General of the [[Anthropological Survey of India]]. He is known principally for his oversight and editorship of the ''[[The People of India|People of India]]'' survey and for his studies of tribal history.

==Life==
Kumar Suresh Singh was the son of the zamindar of Nayagaon in [[Munger]] district in Bihar and a son-in-law of the Maharaja of Chotanagpur. He studied history, coming first in the first-class in the BA (Hons.) examination of [[Patna University]]. He subsequently obtained a master's degree, and finally a PhD which he wrote on the revolutionary, [[Birsa Munda]].<ref name=Frontline20060630>{{cite news |title=Scholar of society |newspaper=Frontline |volume=23 |issue=12 |date=30 June 2006 |url=http://www.flonnet.com/fl2312/stories/20060630006312500.htm |first=T. K. |last=Rajalakshmi |access-date=9 November 2011 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110611204439/http://www.flonnet.com/fl2312/stories/20060630006312500.htm |archive-date=11 June 2011}}</ref>

He joined the Indian Administrative Service (IAS) in 1958. He worked among the [[Santhal people|Santhal]]s<ref name=Frontline20060630/> and then spent the period 1965–1968 as Deputy Commissioner at [[Palamu]], in the [[Chhotanagpur]] area. This posting coincided with the [[Famine in India#Bihar famine|Bihar famine]], for which he helped to organise relief and which introduced some innovative approaches that have subsequently been adopted elsewhere.<ref name=Sinha2007>{{cite journal |title=Obituary: Kumar Suresh Singh (1935–2006) |journal=Indian Historical Review |date=January 2007 |volume=34 |issue=1 |pages=365–368 |first=A. K. |last=Sinha |doi=10.1177/037698360703400136 |s2cid=142819673 }}{{subscription required}}</ref>

His posts in the government of Bihar included being Secretary in various departments: Industries (1973–1974), Rural Development (1974–1975, and 1980–1981), and Forest and Environment (1982–1984). A. K. Sinha has noted that "Because of his honesty, integrity and adherence to the norms of administration, he was not allowed to complete his term in any department in Bihar."<ref name=Sinha2007/>

In between these various government posts, Singh returned to Chhotanagpur as Commissioner for the period 1978–1980. In 1984 he was appointed Director-General of the Anthropological Survey of India (ASI) and also Director of the [[Indira Gandhi Rashtriya Manav Sangrahalaya]] (National Museum of Mankind) in [[Bhopal]].<ref name=Sinha2007/>

Although Singh retired from the ASI in 1993, he remained General Editor of the ''People of India'' series until his death on 20 May 2006. He completed the final volume just before dying, having previously suffering partial [[paralysis]] from a stroke. He was a [[National Fellow]] of the [[Indian Council of Historical Research]] at the time of his death.<ref name=Frontline20060630/><ref name=Sinha2007/> [[Muchkund Dubey]] subsequently commented that {{quote|Kumar Suresh was a kind of a rare person among Indian civil servants. He was of a scholarly bent of mind right from his university days. He had a deep knowledge of a number of disciplines. His monumental contribution People of India will remain as a kind of tribute to his multifaceted talents. His empathy for and commitment to the weaker sections of society will always be remembered. He was one of the three intellectual fathers in the creation of Jharkhand.<ref name=Frontline20060630/>}}

==Tribal studies==
Singh wrote a PhD thesis on Birsa Munda, the leader of an insurgency campaign against British rule. To do this he had to rely significantly on [[folk-lore]] and other forms of [[oral history]] practised by the tribal inhabitants of the [[Jharkhand]] area of Bihar, where in total he spent 15 years conducting fieldwork. Although Singh considered [[Damodar Dharmananda Kosambi]] to be the first mainstream [[subaltern (postcolonialism)|subaltern]] historian, Sinha notes that Singh himself may have been. He went on to produce other works on tribal history.<ref name=Sinha2007/>

==People of India==
Singh had responsibility for the organisation, compilation and oversight of the ''People of India'' survey, which was intended to be an [[anthropology|anthropological]] study of the differences and linkages between all of the communities in India.The survey involved 470 scholars and identified 4694 communities during its period of fieldwork between October 1985 and 1994. Sinha notes a total of 3000 scholars, which figure appears to include those involved at various seminars and workshops. The full results of the survey fill 43 published volumes, of which 12 had been produced at the time of Singh's death.<ref name=Frontline20060630/><ref name=Sinha2007/>

The purpose and methodology of the survey has received criticism. Laura Dudley Jenkins, for example, has said that {{quote|According to its initial circular, "[t]his will be a project on the People of India by the people of India," a phrase ringing with nationalism, yet the goal of this national project is to generate a profile of each community in India, largely defined in terms of caste. Purportedly a work of apolitical anthropology, this endeavor is nevertheless sponsored by the state and uses the administrative categories of Scheduled Castes (SCs) and Scheduled Tribes (STs). Due to India's reservation policies, which reserve quotas of government jobs, parliamentary seats, and university admissions for these disadvantaged groups, controversy rages over their boundaries, numbers, and social conditions. Although castes are a major unit of analysis ... the latest project superimposes the new theme of national unity, a politically useful focus for an ethnography sponsored by the central government of India.|source=<ref>{{cite journal |title=Another "People of India" Project: Colonial and National Anthropology |first=Laura Dudley |last=Jenkins |journal=The Journal of Asian Studies |volume=62 |issue=4 |date=November 2003 |page=1144 |publisher=Association for Asian Studies |jstor=3591762 |doi=10.2307/3591762}}</ref>}}

A review of the first volume of the series over [[Contributions to Indian Sociology]], noted:-
{{Quote|text=The author claims that the present volumes are far superior to the ethnographic descriptions of different castes done during the colonial period; but the first volume is itself reminiscent of Risley’s and Hutton’s writings on castes in the early part of this century.|sign=Bidyut Mohanty|source=<ref>{{Cite journal|last=Mohanty|first=Bidyut|date=May 1996|title=Book reviews and notices : K.S. SINGH, People of India: An introduction. Vol. I. Calcutta: Anthropological Survey of India, 1992. 234 pp. Maps, appendices, bibliogr., Rs. 250|journal=Contributions to Indian Sociology|language=en|volume=30|issue=1|pages=150–151|doi=10.1177/006996679603000114|s2cid=143949630|issn=0069-9667}}</ref>}}

Another opinion favourably contrasts the project with colonial ethnography, with Sinha saying that {{quote|The colonial studies were fragmentary and micro-level; many scholars studied castes, tribes, and village communities within an atomistic framework and followed a quantitative and uncritical methodology. Unlike them, this project was supposed to prepare brief, descriptive anthropological profiles of all communities in India, with special attention to the impact of change and development on them, highlighting the linkages that bring them together.<ref name=Sinha2007/>}}

==Publications==
Aside from his writing, as author and as editor, in volumes related to the ''People of India'' survey, Singh also wrote and edited other works, a selection of which are:

*{{cite book |title=The Dust-Storm and the Hanging Mist: A Study of Birsa Munda and his Movement in Chhotanagpur, 1874–1901 |first=Kumar Suresh |last=Singh |location=Calcutta |publisher=Firma K. L. Mukhopadhyay |year=1966 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=gwAeAAAAMAAJ |access-date=10 November 2011}} – published version of Singh's PhD dissertation
*{{cite book |title=The Indian Famine, 1967: A Study in Crisis and Change |first=Kumar Suresh |last=Singh |location=New Delhi |publisher=People's Publishing House |year=1975 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=kuiwAAAAIAAJ |access-date=9 November 2011}}
*{{cite book |title=Tribal Movements in India |volume=1 |editor-first=Kumar Suresh |editor-last=Singh |location=New Delhi |publisher=Manohar |year=1982 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=moEiAAAAMAAJ |access-date=9 November 2011}}
*{{cite book |title=Birsa Munda and his Movement, 1872–1901: A study of a Millenarian Movement in Chotanagpur |first=Kumar Suresh |last=Singh |location=Calcutta & London |publisher=Oxford University Press |year=1983 |isbn=978-81-7046-205-7 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=lFSgAAAAMAAJ |access-date=9 November 2011}}
*{{cite book |title=Tribal Society in India: An Anthropo-historical Perspective |first=Kumar Suresh |last=Singh |location=New Delhi |publisher=Manohar |year=1985 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=WIAiAAAAMAAJ |access-date=9 November 2011}}
*{{cite book |title=Anthropology, Development, and Nation Building |first1=Aloke Kumar |last1=Kalla |first2=Kumar Suresh |last2=Singh |location=New Delhi |publisher=Concept Publishing Company |year=1987 |isbn=9788170220015 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=mbmAAAAAMAAJ |access-date=9 November 2011}}
*{{cite book |title=Tribal Ethnography, Customary Law, and Change |editor-first=Kumar Suresh |editor-last=Singh |location=New Delhi |publisher=Concept Publishing Company |year=1993 |isbn=978-81-7022-471-6 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=X4bW-_jEvXoC |access-date=9 November 2011}}
*{{cite book |title=Antiquity to Modernity in Tribal India: Tribal Movements in India |editor-first=Kumar Suresh |editor-last=Singh |location=New Delhi |publisher=Inter-India Publications |year=1998 |isbn=978-81-210-0385-8 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=ubRIAAAAYAAJ |access-date=9 November 2011}}
*{{cite book |title=The Tribal Situation in India |editor-first=Kumar Suresh |editor-last=Singh |location=Simla |publisher=Indian Institute of Advanced Study |year=2002 |isbn=978-81-7986-008-3 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=GLGBAAAAMAAJ |access-date=9 November 2011}}

==See also==
*[[William Crooke]]
*[[Herbert Hope Risley]]

==References==
{{reflist}}

==Further reading==
*{{cite news |first=Uday |last=Prakash |url=http://www.tehelka.com/story_main18.asp?filename=op061706the_One.asp |title=The one from the tribe |date=17 June 2006 |publisher=Tehelka |access-date=9 November 2011 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110907142027/http://www.tehelka.com/story_main18.asp?filename=op061706the_One.asp |archive-date=7 September 2011 |url-status=dead }}
*{{cite journal |last=Das |first=N. K. |title=People of India and Indian Anthropology: K S Singh: A Tribute |journal=Economic and Political Weekly |volume=41 |issue=29 |year=2006 |pages=3156–3158 |jstor=4418461 }}

==External links==
*[https://web.archive.org/web/20100417005720/http://www.ansi.gov.in/default.htm Anthropological Survey of India]

{{Authority control}}

{{DEFAULTSORT:Singh, Kumar Suresh}}
[[Category:1935 births]]
[[Category:2006 deaths]]
[[Category:Indian anthropologists]]
[[Category:Indian civil servants]]
[[Category:Patna University alumni]]
[[Category:20th-century Indian biographers]]
[[Category:Indian social sciences writers]]
[[Category:People from Munger district]]
[[Category:Scholars from Bihar]]
[[Category:Scientists from Patna]]
[[Category:20th-century anthropologists]]

Kumar Suresh Singh - Revision history

BDe2021 at 13:54, 19 July 2022